LOUIS XIV, 1643 to 1715
Key-note The Grand Audience Rooms
Compressed regularity giving way in reaction to a ponderous ugliness.
Straight, square, grooved and very squat cabriole legs.
THE REGENCY AND LOUIS XV, 1715 to 1774
Key-note The Boudoir
The Reign of Woman.
Cabriole legs of a perfect lightness and grace.
LOUIS XVI, 1774 to 1793
Key-note The Salon Intime
The transition style between the Bourbon Interior Decoration and that of the "Directorate"
and "Empire," characterised by a return to the classic line which reflects a more serious turn of mind
on part of the Nation in an age of great mental activity.
Legs tapering straight, rounded and grooved. A few square-grooved legs and a few
graceful, slender cabriole legs.
THE FIRST EMPIRE, NAPOLEON I, 1804 to 1814
Classic lines.
Classic decorations with subjects taken from Greek mythologies.
Winged figures, emblems of liberty; antique heads of helmeted warriors,
made like medallions, wreaths, lyres, torches, rosettes, etc.
Besides the wonderful mounts of Ormoulu, designed by the great sculptors
and painters of the period, there was a great deal of fine brass inlaying.
Antique vases taken from ancient tombs were placed in recesses in the walls
of rooms after the style of the ancient "Columbaria."
Every effort was made to surround Napoleon I with the dignity and austere
sumptuousness of a great Roman Emperor. As we have said, he had been in Rome and he had been in Egypt;
the art of the French Empire was reminiscent of both. Napoleon would outstrip the other conquerors of the world.
Some Empire furniture shows the same fine turning which characterizes
Jacobean furniture of both oak and walnut periods. We refer to the round, not spiral, turning. See legs of Empire
sofa on which Madame Récamier reclines in the well-known portrait by David (Louvre).
ENGLISH FURNITURE
THE OAK PERIOD (including early Jacobean)
Gothic, through 14th Century. Renaissance, 16th Century Elizabethan, 16th Century.
Jacobean or Stuart, 17th Century; James I, Charles I and II, and James II, 1603-1688.
THE WALNUT PERIOD
Late Jacobean. William and Mary, 1688. Queen Anne, 1702.
"MAHOGANY" PERIOD (and other imported woods), or, CHIPPENDALE PERIOD.
Chippendale. HEPPELWHITE. SHERATON THE ADAM BROTHERS.
18th Century.
GOTHIC PERIOD, Through 14th Century.
Almost no furniture exists of the 13th Century. We get the majority of our ideas from illustrated
manuscripts of that time. The furniture was carved oak or plain oak ornamented with iron scroll work, intended
both for strength and decoration.
RENAISSANCE OR ELIZABETHAN, 16th Century.
The characteristic, heavy, wide mouldings and small panels, and heavy
round carving.
JACOBEAN OR STUART PERIOD, 17th Century.
WALNUT PERIOD, late 17th Century.
Panels large and mouldings very narrow and flat, or no mouldings at all, and flat carving.
The classic influence shown during the period of the Commonwealth in designs, pilastars and pediments was the
result of a classic reaction, all elaboration being resented. The Restoration brought in elaborate carving. Dutch
influence is exemplified in the fashion for inlaying imported from Holland, as well as the tulip design. Turned legs,
stretchers, borders and spiral turnings, characterized Jacobean style.
In the GOTHIC PERIOD (extending through 14th Century), as the delightful irregularity in
line and decoration shows, there was NO SET TYPE; each piece was an individual creation and showed the personality
of maker.
Tables, chests, presses (wardrobes), chairs and benches or settles.
During RENAISSANCE OR ELIZABETHAN PERIOD (16th Century) types begin to establish and repeat themselves.
Table chests, presses, chairs, benches, settles, and small chests of drawers.
In the JACOBEAN (17th Century) there was already a set type, pieces made all alike, turned out by the hundreds.
Inlaying in ebony, ivory, mother-of-pearl, and ebonised oblong bosses of the jewel type (last half of 17th
Century). The tulip design introduced from Holland as decoration.
Turned and carved frames and stretchers; caned seats and backs to chairs, velvet cushions, velvet satin damask
and needlework upholstery, the seats stuffed.
Henry VIII made England Protestant, it having been Roman Catholic for several hundred years before
the coming of the Anglo-Saxons and for a thousand years after.
PROTESTANT.
QUEEN ELIZABETH. "The Elizabethan Period."
STUART. ROMAN CATHOLIC. "JACOBEAN."
JAMES I. 1603. CHARLES I. (Puritan Revolution), 1628.
PURITAN.
Oliver Cromwell. 1649. Commonwealth.
STUART. ROMAN CATHOLIC. "JACOBEAN."
{Charles II. (1660), Restoration. James II. (1686), Deposition and Flight.
PROTESTANT.
William—Prince of Orange (Holland), 1688. Who had married the English Princess Mary
and was the only available Protestant (1688).
