HOUSE AND GARDEN 
January, 1911 
54 
ADVANCE EXHIBIT of 
SPRING and SUMMER STYLES 
All the finer attributes of “FLINT QUALITY’ will be found 
in our Advance Showing of Spring and Summer Styles. 
These comprise the newest productions in Enameled and Light 
Colored Woods including exquisite reproductions of Eighteenth Century 
designs, both English and French, many of which have present day 
requirements added and cannot be duplicated elsewhere. 
Seventy Years’ Service has confirmed FLINT’S FINE FURNITURE, 
enhanced the value of the FLINT Trade-Mark and established beyond 
dispute our guarantee for LOWEST PRICES and HIGHEST 
QUALITY.' 
Geo. C. Flint Co. 
•43-47West 23-St. 24-28West 24~St. 
[0R1G1 NA'IfM ANUFAGiTURERSl 
/IT IS THE BEST FLOOR MADE 
jy FOR CHURCHES. SCHOOLS. BANKS. PUBLIC BUILDINGS. Sa 
r THEATRES AND PRIVATE RESIDENCES. BEING SANITARY N 
NON-SLIPPERY SOFT AND COMFORTABLE TO THE TREAD, 
BEAUTIFUL IN COLORS AND DESIGNS AND DURABLE. 
New York, N Y., 91-93 Chambers Street St. Louis, Mo., 218-220 Chestnut Street 
Chicago, III., 150 Lake Street Portland, Ore., 40 First Street 
Philadelphia, Pa,, 118-120 North 8th Street Boston, Mass., 232 Summer Street 
San Francisco, Calif., 129-131 First Street Indianapolis, Ind., 207-209 South Meridian Street 
Pittsburg, Pa., 933-935 Liberty Avenue London, England, 13-15 Southampton Row 
Spokane, Wash., 183 South Lincoln Street 
the ends of the sideboards. The urn¬ 
shaped knife-cases were especially beauti¬ 
ful. The large pieces of furniture, such as 
highboys, chests-of-drawers, and wash- 
stands, changed very little from those made 
in the day of Chippendale, and retained 
much of their heaviness of design. The 
best work of Hepplewhite & Co. was done 
between 1785-1795. 
Thomas Sheraton was born in 1750, and 
was a journeyman cabinet-maker when he 
went to London. His great genius for fur¬ 
niture design was combined with a love of 
writing tracts and sermons, and he also 
published a book on furniture called the 
“Drawing Book.” Unfortunately for his 
success in life, he had a most disagreeable 
personality, being conceited, jealous, and 
perfectly willing to pour scorn on his 
brother cabinet-makers. This impression 
he quite frankly gives about himself in his 
books. The name of Robert Adam is not 
mentioned, and this seems particularly un¬ 
pleasant when one thinks of the latter’s un¬ 
doubted influence on Sheraton’s work. 
Sheraton’s unfortunate disposition prob¬ 
ably helped to make his life a failure, and 
when he died he left his family in very 
poor circumstances. There is no doubt, 
liowever, that he designed most beautiful 
furniture, although much of the work at¬ 
tributed to him may have been done by 
Shearer and others. His influence was so 
great that it has at least given his name to 
a very beautiful period of furniture. 
Sheraton’s chair backs are rectangular in 
design, with urn splats, and splats divided 
into seven radiates, and also many other 
designs. The legs for his furniture were at 
first plain, and then tapering and reeded. 
He used some carving, and a great deal of 
stainwood and tulipwood were inlaid in the 
mahogany; he also used rosewood. The 
bellflower, urn, festoons, and acanthus 
were all favorites of his for the decoration. 
Sheraton’s list of articles of furniture is 
long, for he made almost everything from 
knife-boxes to “chamber-horses,” which 
were contrivances of a saddle and springs 
for people to take exercise upon at home. 
His sideboards, card-tables, sewing-tables, 
tables of every kind, chairs—in fact, every¬ 
thing he made during his best period— 
have a sureness and beauty of line that 
makes it doubly sad that through the stress 
of circumstances he should have deserted 
it for the style of the Empire that was then 
the fashion in France. Some of his Em¬ 
pire designs have much beauty, while oth¬ 
ers are too dreadful, but it was the begin¬ 
ning of the end, and the nineteenth cen¬ 
tury saw the beautiful principles of the 
eighteenth century lost in a bog of ugli¬ 
ness. 
There were many other cabinet-makers 
of merit that space does not allow me to 
mention, but the great four who stood head 
and shoulders above them all were Chip¬ 
pendale, Adam, Hepplewhite and Shera¬ 
ton. They, being human, did much work 
that is best forgotten, but the heights to 
which they all rose have set a standard for 
English furniture in beauty and construc¬ 
tion that it would be well to keep in mind. 
In writing to advertisers please mention House an p Garden. 
