Decorative Processes

Carving was the chief decorative process applied to the furniture produced by Chippendale and the men of his school. Chippendale's father, it must be remembered, was a carver as well as a cabinet-maker, and 12

Chippendale's talent for carving was an inherited as well as an assiduously cultivated taste. He saw everything with the eyes of a carver, and such a master of his art was he that paint and inlay or any of the other processes freely employed, both before and after his day, were not needed for the embellishment of his furniture. His imitators all followed his lead in placing their chief dependence on carving. The great development of delicately carved ornament that took place at this epoch would not have been possible with any other wood than mahogany, which supplied just the necessary medium for the intricate work so highly esteemed. Chippendale himself never lost an opportunity to lavish the most elaborate carving upon any piece that his patrons could be induced to pay for. Some of his work is so overloaded with carving that its beauty is destroyed. These flights of excess, however, were rare, and most of his pieces, though more or less ornate, kept within the bounds of good taste. His most pleasing and graceful work is of the "inexpensive" type previously alluded to. It was, fortunately, only his wealthiest patrons who could afford to allow him free reign to indulge his bent for ingenious carving.

The Chippendale imitators, for the most part, refrained from attempting the most elaborate type of work, and when they did their inability to manage proportion and detail at once betrayed their inferiority.

Gilding was the next process to be considered after carving. The gilding was used, with very few exceptions, altogether for the embellishment of mirror frames. In comparatively rare instances it was used in conjunction with carving and applied to mahogany for purposes of extra enrichment.

Lacquer was also used to a slight extent, and that almost altogether in the Chinese style, for the embellishment of some of the furniture. There was not enough used, however, to affect seriously the generality of the statement that carving was the essentially popular Chippendale process of decoration.

Fretting or the use of fretwork was practised to a large extent for the adornment of table edges and the tops of cabinet work (Plates XIX, p. 174; XVII, p. 166; XV, p. 154). In such cases it was pierced. When used for the enrichment of table or chair legs or underfraining the tables or any other part of cabinet-work, it was applied to a solid background (Plate XV, p. 154).

Turning was necessarily used to some extent in conjunction with carving, but its application was mechanical rather than decorative and it could not be reckoned as a decorative process in the same manner as the turning of the Carolean period.

Veneering was used from time to time, especially in the furniture of French type, to obtain an especially rich effect by the beauty of the grain in the panels of doors.

Inlay was employed in one or two instances, but with such extreme rarity that it may be questioned whether Chippendale and his avowed followers ever used it except in the execution of a special order designed, in all probability, by some one other than themselves.