House & Garden 
60 
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The unusual, when beautiful and in harmony 
with its surroundings, has added decorative value. 
This delightful example of the cabinet 
maker's art—a half circular commode 
and mirror, faithfully reproducing 
the work of Hepplewhite as cabinet 
makers and Pergolisi as artist and 
designer during the Adam period 
suggests the many charming pieces 
of furniture here awaiting your selec¬ 
tion, any one of which may be just 
what you need to give to your home 
that note of distinction which you 
so much desire. 
Bremrxer service includes every requirement for making the 
interior of your house a home , more beautiful , more liveable. 
You will find our permanent exhibition of 
ideal interiors of exceptional interest. We 
give every attention to our out of town 
commissions and are always glad to submit 
special designs and estimates when desired. 
Illustrated booklet sent upon request. 
J. R. BREMNER CO 
68o-b86 Madison Avenue 
at Sixty-second Street 
Telephone Plaza 470 
NEW YORK 
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Spanish Chairs and Tables of the 18th Century 
(Continued /: 
with the products of English craftsmen 
of about the same date. Of course there 
were differences, and marked differences 
at that, which were quite enough to im¬ 
part the unmistakable stamp of nation¬ 
ality. One evidence of this relationship 
is to be seen in Figure 5, which, notwith¬ 
standing certain “Queen Anne’’ tenden¬ 
cies in the style of the back, seems to 
belong in the “Chippendale” category. 
Setting aside other items of diversity 
from the familiar English Chippendale 
type, the significant features to be noted 
are the use of a caned seat with this pat¬ 
tern of chair; the employment of carved 
Rococo ornament mid-high the back- 
posts; and the free display of gilding on 
the carving, the gold standing out in re¬ 
lief on the mahogany ground. These 
features and the manner of their occur¬ 
rence were characteristically indicative 
of Spanish usage. Further than this, 
the somewhat hybrid nature of the chair 
seems partly to bridge a gap in the 
process of transition and to occupy a 
middle ground between the Baroque and 
Rococo in Spanish seating furniture. 
Rococo manifestations were usually 
either very good or very bad. The cred¬ 
itable pieces of seating furniture and 
tables were so closely patterned after 
French models that there is no object in 
giving them a special discussion, while 
the other Rococo pieces that were not so 
patterned were generally so atrocious 
that it is better to consign them to ob¬ 
livion. It will be quite sufficient for our 
purpose, therefore, to point to one rather 
good piece, the armchair shown in Figure 
3, and call attention to the shape of the 
back. In the first place, the shaping of 
the top is reminiscent of some of the 
earlier forms of cresting although the 
contour is patently tamed and held in 
check by current convention; in the sec¬ 
ond place, the sides of the back show 
the same bulging lines noted in dis¬ 
cussing the “jowls” of Figure 15. 
Classic Feeling 
The revival of classic feeling, syn¬ 
chronous with the Adam influence in 
England and the Louis Seize style in 
France, is represented in the present in¬ 
stance by the side chair shown in Figure 
11. There was a close affiliation with 
French forms, the only significant differ¬ 
ence being that the Spanish, like the 
Italian craftsmen of the same period, 
were apt to incline more to robust pro¬ 
portions rather than to attenuation. 
Later developments, towards the very 
end of the century, were comparable in 
delicacy and ingenious freshness to some 
of the refined and graceful designs of 
Sheraton. Witness the mahogany and 
parcel gilt armchair with caned seat, 
shown in Figure 14. This particular 
chair, it is true, is of Portuguese prove¬ 
nance, but it had plenty of counterparts 
or intimately related forms of Spanish 
workmanship. Before quitting the sub¬ 
ject of chairs, it remains only to mention 
the three peasant chairs shown in Figure 
17. These chairs are of an Italian type 
but are found in Valencia and in the 
islands of Majorca and Minorca, prob¬ 
ably as the result of trading activities. 
Sofas and Stools 
Sofas and stools, as might be expected, 
followed analogous lines of development 
with the successive styles of chairs. The 
mahogany bench or settee, Figure 4. of 
rom page 58) 
Spanish colonial origin, indicates the 
striking analogy existing between the 
Sheratonesque Italian “square-backed” 
seating furniture of the end of the 18th 
Century and the articles produced by 
Spanish or by Spanish-trained crafts¬ 
men. Spanish Louis Quinze and Louis 
Seize sofas and settees were scarcely dis¬ 
tinguishable from their French proto¬ 
types except by their buxom proportions, 
as previously noted. 
Spanish Tables 
Spanish tables of the 18th Century 
display much less national individuality 
in their design than the tables of an 
earlier period. In the main they corre¬ 
spond pretty closely with the parallel 
fashions of contemporary tables else¬ 
where. Several examples will serve to 
show to about what extent national feel¬ 
ing produced differences. The very late 
17th Century or early 18th Century 
painted oval gate table, Figure 2, from 
the Basque provinces, is of peculiar in¬ 
terest for the design and for the manner 
of decoration. It will be noticed that 
both the swinging turned baluster legs 
are split in half so that, when closed, 
there are but four complete legs, the cor¬ 
responding halves being permanently 
fixed at the ends of the underframing 
and stretchers. This is a characteristic 
Spanish device. The framing, legs and 
oval top are painted a yellowish straw 
color with dark graining. The middle 
and each of the drop leaves are adorned 
with dark blue elongated quarterfoils en¬ 
closing polychrome landscapes. Figure 
9, a piece of about the same date, has 
walnut legs and a polychrome top 
painted in bold devices. This also is a 
gate table; two of the baluster turned 
legs are split, as in the preceding in¬ 
stance, and their swinging halves pull 
out to support the leaves when opened. 
The little walnut cabriole-legged gate 
table of Queen Anne affinities, Figure 16, 
shows a peculiarly Spanish touch* in the 
scalloped, shaped stretchers and, like the 
two foregoing specimens, is worthy of 
modern emulation. 
We have now made a survey of repre¬ 
sentative manifestations of 18th Century 
Spanish furniture, noting the successive 
ascendencies of the Baroque, Rococo, 
Classic and post-Classic influences. We 
have also marked the parallelisms be¬ 
tween Spanish forms of expression and 
English forms with which we are nat¬ 
urally more familiar. At the same time, 
we have observed the particulars in 
which the national genius of interpreta¬ 
tion differentiated Spanish types from 
contemporary types elsewhere. It now 
remains that we should make practical 
deductions from our survey. 
It is not too much to say that the 
dominant qualities of 18 th Century 
Spanish furniture are dignity, virility of 
proportion, a rich warmth of color in¬ 
terest together with an appreciable ele¬ 
ment of human domesticity and, in many 
cases, a certain engaging refinement of 
line and of decorative detail. 
We live in an age of catholic appre¬ 
ciation and of liberal and untrammelled 
interpretation in decorative matters. It 
may, therefore, be assumed that the in¬ 
dividual study of Spanish furniture will 
reward the searcher with many a piece 
whose qualities, as just mentioned, will 
ensure harmonious incorporation in a 
diversity of schemes. 
