The Studio yearbook of decorative art (1906)

Furniture

their various capabilities,
the older method of con-
struction cannot be ex-
clusively adhered to>
nevertheless, there is no
doubt but that the ideal
to aim at should be to
dispense as far as possible
with adventitious aids,
which interfere with the
highest development of
the craft.

Turning, again, from the
age of oak to a later
epoch, consider the
achievements of a Chip-
pendale, for instance,

recessed sideboard designed BY w. h. davies 1 .

and cabinets executed by maple & co., ltd. whose furniture, whether or

not one admires its design,
all allow to be the model

With regard to the last, may it not be said that of refined and masterly execution. These qualities
the competitive manufacturer at the present time, cannot be studied too carefully; for, though there are
driven as he is to cheapen production, resorts too not wanting cabinet-makers of the present day who
freely to the more facile plan of driving in nails and are capable of turning out work every whit as good
screws, where older generations would, for strength as Chippendale's, the mean average of the trade is
and security, have relied
more on pure cabinet-
making and joinery con-
struction ? In the case of
old oak furniture one
point that cannot fail to
strike even the most super-
ficial observer, is the
simple and workmanlike
way it is put together and
pegged with wooden pins,
or, as shipbuilders term
them, trenails. The ab-
sence, as a rule, of extra-
neous metal, stabbing, so
to speak, into the flesh
and tissues of the wood, is
one of the secrets of the
venerable age of oak furni-
ture. Otherwise, with the
poison of rust eating into
its very heart and corrod-
ing within it day and night
for centuries, the wood
must have been burst
asunder and have perished
long since. But if, in
view of the numerous kinds

jacobean dresser in oak designed and executed by

of wood now in use, and Bartholomew & Fletcher

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