August, 1917 
21 
One of a pair of early Hepplewhite console tables 
in curly satinwood. The decorations are inlaid 
with vari-colored woods instead of being painted. 
It dates from about 1790 
One of a pair of Adam satinwood console tables. An exceptionally fine reproduction worthy of 
Decorations are inlaid. The stretchers are a the collector’s attention. Deep cream enamel 
later development. From the period about 1790. base; high lights of carving touched with gold. 
Cou7‘tesy of R. W. Lehne Courtesy Hampton Shops 
The position for the console is directly 
against the wall beneath a tall mirror 
or tapestry. The placing of this Louis 
XVI console is after the accepted fashion 
In the center above is a Hepplewhite 
console table in apple-green with decora¬ 
tions of garlands and a cameo medallion. 
Bow front and concave sides. About 1790 
find both forms in early 18th Century Italian 
furniture, and in Spain, Austria, Germany 
and Russia one also comes across types of 
consoles that, dependent as they nearly al¬ 
ways are on French models, still exhibit oc¬ 
casional variations in design that link them 
to the art traditions characteristic of the 
land of their manufacture. 
18th Century Types 
luxurious console for ornament’s sake into 
the generous console table for utility’s sake, 
which we soon find in the English dining 
rooms. It did not take long for this to sug¬ 
gest the sideboard. 
The Influence of Adam 
Reference has already been made to the 
interest in consoles on the part of the archi¬ 
tects of today. This brings to mind the fine 
console tables of the Brothers Adam—pieces 
which the collector will do well to acquire 
whenever the opportunity presents itself— 
for Robert Adam was an architect who de¬ 
signed furniture hut was not himself a cabi¬ 
net maker. Grace M. Vallois, the author of 
“First Steps in Collecting,” says of him: 
“To Adam more than to anyone else we owe 
the marked classical taste of the late 18th 
Century. Robert, the best known and clev¬ 
erest of the three brothers, had a natural 
leaning towards this style of art, and he 
early determined, if possible, to steep 
himself in the traditions of classic art. 
In 1755 and 1756 he made a long ar¬ 
tistic tour, visiting France and Italy, 
but neither of these countries gave 
him just what he wanted, which was 
to see a house of the old Romans and 
absorb into his brain their ideas on 
domestic architecture and adapt them 
to the requirements of the 18th Cen¬ 
tury. He attained his object in 1757, 
when, accompanied by the French ar¬ 
chitect, Clerisseau, he gave himself 
up to the study at Spalatro in Dalma¬ 
tia of the remains of Diocletian’s 
palace.” 
In finding a place for the console 
in the modern residence, it is well to 
remember its original use. Under a 
long mirror in the drawing room was 
the way it was generally placed, the 
tables being used in pairs to effect a 
studied balance. It can be advan¬ 
tageously placed in the hallway, 
where its dignity will add to the char¬ 
acter of the entrance and at the same 
time take up but little room. In din¬ 
ing rooms consoles are arranged to 
serve as sideboards. 
The type of console will naturally 
determine the type of mirror or deco¬ 
ration suitable to hang above it. 
Formal apartments and the smaller re¬ 
ception rooms of the 18th Century houses 
of more or less pretension came to feel the 
need of what one furniture lover aptly called 
“a table that was not a table.” In fact, 
Sheraton insisted that portables, as he called 
consoles, were indispensable in the drawing 
room. Marble shelves the width of small 
—and sometimes, indeed, of very large— 
tables were supported by brackets along the 
wall, bringing the shelf to the height of a 
table top. In earlier examples the bold, 
florid and exaggerated types in soft 
wood, carved and gilded, often car¬ 
ried decoration to extremes. The 
consoles found place beneath great 
mirrors, as on this page, and occa¬ 
sionally beneath large paintings, 
tapestries and the like. 
In early consoles there was great 
variety in their supporting brackets, 
the motifs of ornament being taken 
from flowers, foliage, parts of the 
human form, animal and bird forms, 
rococo vagaries, and so on. During 
the Empire the eagle came to be 
popularly employed as a console sup¬ 
port by the French furniture design¬ 
ers of the time. In the collection of 
the Duke of Beaufort are a number 
of the finest examples of the eagle 
consoles. There are also some fine 
examples in the state dining room in 
the White House. Before long the 
earliest forms of console supports 
gave way to more extensive supports 
and finally these reached the floor, as 
in those consoles which have the cab¬ 
riole form of support. 
Sideboards were unknown during 
the first part of the 18th Century, but 
when the console table was intro¬ 
duced into England, it rapidly de¬ 
veloped from the French idea of the 
Wallace 
beaia 
