For dining, the draw-table, whose two ends
could be drawn out, gradually replaced the long, heavy oak table.
Most draw-tables were of oak, but some were of walnut. The legs
were bulbous, perhaps shaped as Ionic capitals, a decoration
sometimes continued on the frieze.
Gate-leg tables, introduced in the 16th century,
were popular throughout the 17th. They had a folding top, which
would be opened out and supported on the “gate-leg”.
By the 1660s walnut gate-leg tables with spiral, turned legs
were replacing draw-tables for dining.
FURNITURE - Chairs and couches
In the 17th century armchairs were symbols
of status: the great chair and its footstool were reserved for
the head of the household, with perhaps one other for his wife
or an important guest. By c. 1610 in any aristocratic household
an upholstered chair would have replaced the earlier wooden
one, and was usually made en suite with a footstool, armless
chairs, and stools. Farthingale chairs were the most common
upholstered chairs. They had a padded back and seat, with a
gap between that enabled women wearing a farthingale (hoped
whale-bone petticoat) to sit comfortably. The covering was of
turkeywork (knotted pile fabric, creating an effect similar
to a Turkish carpet), cloth or leather.
Caning for the backs and seats of chairs was
introduced from the Netherlands in the 1660s. Early caning was
of wide mesh. The front stretcher, the supports flanking the
cane panel of the back and the cresting rail (joining the two
supports) were all carved, and cushions covered the cane seat.
By the 1670s the mesh had become finer and the height of the
back had increased, reaching an extreme by the century’s
end. The earlier straight stretcher and cresting rail were replaced
by pierced and arched forms.
Armchairs were solidly upholstered and lost their farthingale
gap; the most comfortable were wing chairs. Most late-17th-century
armchairs were of walnut, but some were of beech-wood painted
black, or “ebonised”, to resemble the expensive
imported wood.
Sgabello chairs (carved wooden chairs with
two solid supports in place of legs) usually made of walnut,
often partly gilded, were made in England in the 1630s as well
as imported.
Case furniture
In the 17th century, chests – made by
joiners and usually of oak – were the traditional form
of storage for all sorts of objects, from books and papers to
linen and clothes. Some were cased entirely in iron and had
massive locks, for use as strong-boxes; others, only slightly
less secure, were bound with iron; most were panelled, some
had carved decoration. The style of chests was less affected
by changing fashions than that of any other piece of furniture,
and in the following century provincial chests still resembled
those made a hundred years earlier. The coffer was a type of
chest with a domed lid and wood encased in leather or fabric
and was made by cofferers, who belonged to the Leathersellers’
Company. Large coffers were used as travelling trunks. They
had leather covers held in place by brass studs arranged in
decorative patterns, and their corners were strengthened by
metal mounts. Small coffers, covered in velvet or embroidered
silk, were decorative enough to sit on dressing tables and were
used as jewel boxes.
