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Regency Furniture
Frances Collard
Regency furniture is popularly defined as the furniture produced in the period 1790-1840 and this definition is followed here.
These fifty years produced some of the most inventive and decorative furniture that has ever been made, for the end of the eighteenth century saw the move away from strict Palladian influence which produced the staid, respectable furniture beloved by generations of scholars, dealers and collectors.
However, in the last fifty years the shortage of ‘Georgian’ furniture and the realisation that Regency furniture meets the decorative requirements of overseas buyers has led to a complete reappraisal of the production of these turbulent years. The story is complex and fascinating, both from the design as well as social aspects, and apart from Margaret Jourdain’s pioneer work in 1948 there has been no standard text on what has now become one of the most expensive and least understood periods of English furniture.
For the influences on Regency design and taste were legion: from Sheraton’s neoclassicism, Henry Holland’s Anglo-French taste, the Greek revival of Thomas Hope, and the Chinoiserie favoured by the Prince Regent, to an interest in the Gothic, Old English and rustic. Patrons, newly rich from the Industrial Revolution or with wealth derived from the Colonies, encouraged furniture makers to indulge in novelties of invention to satisfy the demands of fashion. Many master craftsmen and cabinet makers, both in London and the provinces, who also became important influences on the period, such as Bullock of Liverpool, Gillows of Lancaster, Hervé, Pugin, Sheraton and Chippendale, all contributed to the exchange of new ideas and splendid craftsmanship.
Frances Collard, of the Victoria and Albert Museum, carefully explains the interrelated influences of Royal and wealthy patrons on architects, interior designers and furniture makers, as well as the demands of the less affluent which were involved in this extraordinary era of creativity. Her fascinating text is complemented with 40 colour plates and 304 black and white illustrations.
The Author
Frances Collard began her museum career at the Army Museums Ogilby Trust, a charitable trust offering financial and practical help to military museums.
She joined the Department of Textiles, Victoria and Albert Museum, in 1973, where she worked on gothic and medieval tapestries and other historic textiles, and moved to the Department of Furniture and Interior Design in 1979. Her main responsibility is the archive of material relating to the history of furniture and of interiors and she has lectured and written on a range of subjects, including tapestries, the role of textiles in the historic interior, upholstery and early nineteenth century furniture and interior decoration.
Her current research is a study of the furniture designed by Sir John Soane and she is preparing a book of original curtain designs. Mrs. Collard is married to an interior designer and lives in West London.
Specifications
Size: 279 x 216 mm
Pages: 348
Illustrations: 40 col. 304 b&w
ISBN: 0 907462 51 0
Price: $89.50
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