16 
House & Garden 
An exact copy of an old French 
chaise longue, this piece can be 
classed among the reproductions. It 
shows no artificial aging. The design 
was merely copied. By Miss Gheen, 
decorator 
The Italian credenza 
below was shown at 
the Manufacturers’ 
& Designers’ Ex¬ 
it ibition in the 
Metropolitan by the 
Kensington Manu¬ 
facturing Company 
which is now current that “they are making the 
antiques better these days!” It is well known 
that certain kinds of old table tops from abroad 
used to be sadly warped after a few months in 
this country; but in recent times these tops 
have been built so as to resist our temperature 
changes,—but they still are just as old. 
Assuming that all dealers are models of 
veracity—for w 7 e must begin somewhere—we 
may also assume that all articles sold as an¬ 
tiques are honestly old pieces, truthfully the 
work of a time antedating our own. 
Reproductions 
Next come the reproductions. These are 
copies of authentic old pieces; or put it in trade 
parlance, they are “authentic copies of an¬ 
tiques”. Have we come to a question of sheer 
morality? If the reproduction is branded on 
both quarters with the sign of its copyism, the 
gods of design be praised! Then only do we 
know it for what it is. We do not object to 
reproductions as such, but we must be honest 
all round. It will be of no avail for the maker 
honestly to set out to copy an old piece, and for 
the dealer to sell the article honestly for a copy, 
if the customer takes it home and parades it as 
a “real antique”. The failure of one link de¬ 
stroys the chain. Unfortunately there are num¬ 
bers of dishonest makers, dishonest dealers and 
dishonest customers; so we shall regularly have 
a brisk trade in fakes, reproductions made, sold 
or bought for the real thing. 
And in the third place come the pieces of 
simulated age. These are not “real” antiques; 
nor are they reproductions of old pieces. They 
are objects made perhaps according to an en¬ 
tirely new design but along old lines. They 
are conceived by an expert familiar with the 
history of style and they are finished off by 
other experts familiar with the effects wrought 
by time, wear and decay upon materials, col- 
Old-looking pieces are manufactured to be used in a decorative 
scheme where antiques are not available. This Jacobean oak 
chest, for example, can be used as a dining room piece. It is a 
faithful reproduction, artificially aged, and is frankly what it is 
intended to be. Courtesy of W. & J. Sloane 
The refectory table shown 
below is an old-looking 
piece — even the stretchers 
are worn and the legs show 
signs of hard usage. By the 
Kensington Mfg. Co. 
