Ince And Mayhew

Ince and Mayhew, cabinet-makers and "upholders," whose shop was in London, in Broad Street, Golden Square, are among the "others" whose names have come down to us chiefly, no doubt, because they published their "Universal System of Household Furniture, "wherein they inform their patrons and readers that "every article treated of" in its pages may be executed in their work-rooms "on the most reasonable terms, with the utmost neatness and punctuality." A bombastic title page and a flowery dedication to the Duke of Marlborough are followed by a preface which warns the reader that "in furnishing, all should be in propriety, elegance should always be joined with a peculiar neatness through the whole House, or otherwise immense Expense may be thrown away to no purpose, either in use or appearance; with the same regard any gentleman may furnish as neat at a small expense, as he can elegant and superb at a great one."

Just precisely what all the foregoing may mean we shall not attempt to say but pass on to the plates with their accompanying descriptions in both French and English. They were engraved by Darly, Chippendale's engraver, and this fact probably explains their improvement upon the plates put forth by the Society of Upholsterers. Nevertheless, many of the designs are practically the same and a number of the details are absolutely identical. One might really say that Ince and Mayhew's book is a colossal caricature of Chippendale's Director, for all of Chippendale's faults and absurdities they have exaggerated and overlarded everything with an accumulation of fantastic and meaningless ornament. The extreme ugliness and inanity of many of their more elaborate pieces could find a worthy parallel only in the wildest flights of mid-Victorian invention.

As was quite natural, they played to the popular taste of the day and of course produced pieces in the Chinese style, the Gothic, the French, and heaven only knows what beside. Their work is unconvincing, and patently copied from Chippendale's less-inspired and over-elaborate models without the wit or discernment to grasp the good and eschew the bad. They were pirates wholly ignorant of the principles of design and, as one might expect, their creations are vulgar, grotesque and weak with their superfluity of ornament and their incoherent lack of symmetry.

They made the usual variety of pieces required by wealthy patrons at that day. The chief value in knowing about their work lies in being able to distinguish it by its utter badness from the work of other contemporary makers and to exonerate Chippendale from the blame, often saddled upon him, of producing such misshapen, monstrous objects. A contemplation of the Ince and Mayhew designs may also help us to realise that not all old furniture is good merely by virtue of its age and that there is always room and need for discriminating taste and judgment - a fact that many are apparently prone to forget.

Among the other furniture makers or designers who were working at this time, beside those to whom special sections are devoted in this chapter, must be mentioned Copeland, Lock, Johnson and Crunden. They wrought in a great diversity of styles, and some of their performances were creditable while others were far from the standard of excellence set by the achievements of Chippendale and his greater contemporaries.

In this necessarily brief retrospect the Gillows of Lancaster and London must not be forgotten and the honourable place they occupied as cabinet-makers.