Collection: Antique Furniture

What to Look For When Buying

Construction tells you more than surface appearance. Hand cut dovetails are slightly irregular, with narrow pins, while machine cut joints from the later nineteenth century onwards are uniform. Look at the underside, the back and the interior of drawers, the surfaces nobody finished carefully, where saw marks, oxidation and the natural darkening of unpolished timber are difficult to fake convincingly. Timber shrinks across the grain and not along it, so a round table top that has become slightly oval, or a drawer bottom that has opened a gap at one edge, is evidence of genuine age rather than a fault.

Then establish what is original. Replaced feet, later handles, re-cut mouldings and a top that does not belong to its base are all common, and a marriage of two period pieces into one is one of the most frequent alterations in the trade. Check that colour and wear are consistent across a piece, that handle holes do not show evidence of earlier fittings in different positions, and that the timber behind a mount matches the timber around it. Alterations do not disqualify a piece, and many good pieces have been sympathetically repaired over a long life, but they belong in an accurate description. We assess and document construction, restoration and condition in every listing, and our team is available to discuss any individual piece before a purchase is made.

Caring for Antique Furniture

Stability is everything. Antique timber has reached equilibrium with the conditions it has lived in, and rapid change is what causes damage, so the aim is to avoid swings in humidity and temperature rather than to hit a particular number. Keep pieces away from air conditioning outlets, heating vents, open fires and exterior doors, and out of direct sunlight, which bleaches timber unevenly and degrades old finishes and leather. In humid and coastal conditions, air circulation behind and beneath a piece matters, so avoid pushing case furniture hard against an external wall.

Dust with a soft, dry cloth rather than a spray. Use a good quality microcrystalline or beeswax paste wax two or three times a year at most, applied thinly and buffed out, and avoid aerosol and silicone based polishes entirely, since silicone builds up, clouds the surface and makes future restoration considerably harder. Never use water on veneered or French polished surfaces. Lift furniture rather than dragging it, and lift from the strongest structural points, meaning the seat rails of a chair rather than its arms or back, and the carcass of a cabinet rather than its top or cornice.

Periods Worth Knowing

Georgian furniture is the most sought after and the most restrained, relying on proportion, timber selection and cabinet making of high order rather than applied ornament, with mahogany dominating from the middle of the eighteenth century. Regency work is bolder and more architectural, drawing on classical sources, with rosewood, brass inlay and strong linear forms. Victorian furniture is the most various and the most widely available, ranging from finely made walnut and burr walnut pieces to heavily carved oak, and it represents the best value in the market for anyone furnishing a house rather than assembling a collection. Edwardian furniture returns to lighter forms and revives eighteenth century models, often in satinwood and mahogany with inlaid decoration.