Reproduction of a Sheraton wing-chair 223

Slat-backed chair 223

Group of chairs and pie-crust table 232

Groups of chairs 233

Reproduction of Jacobean buffet 236

Group of mirrors 237

Reproduction of William and Mary settee 240

Adaptation of Georgian ideas to William and Mary dressing table 240

Two Adam chairs 241

Jacobean day-bed 241

Reproductions of Chippendale table and Hepplewhite desk 244

Reproduction of Sheraton chest of drawers 245

Reproduction of William and Mary chest of drawers 245

A modern sun-room 246

Sheraton sofa 247

Hepplewhite chair and nest of tables 247

Chippendale wing-chair 247

Modern paneled living-room 248

Empire bed 248

Hancock desk, and fine old highboy 249

Preface

To try to write a history of furniture in a fairly short space is almost as hard as the square peg and round hole problem.  No matter how one tries, it will not fit.  One has to leave out so much of importance, so much of historic and artistic interest, so much of the life of the people that helps to make the subject vivid, and has to take so much for granted, that the task seems almost impossible.  In spite of this I shall try to give in the following pages a general but necessarily short review of the field, hoping that it may help those wishing to furnish their homes in some special period style.  The average person cannot study all the subject thoroughly, but it certainly adds interest to the problems of one’s own home to know something of how the great periods of decoration grew one from another, how the influence of art in one country made itself felt in the next, molding and changing taste and educating the people to a higher sense of beauty.