A Regency Home Library Bookcase, 1808

by Stephen J. Gertz

One of 158 hand-colored aquatint plates from:

SMITH, George. A Collection of Designs for Household Furniture and Interior Decoration. London: J. Taylor, n.d. [1808]. Quarto (279 x 220 mm). First edition.

Abbey, Life 71.

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Image courtesy of Christie's, who recently offered this volume, with our thanks.
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Herman Melville's Travel Desk Comes to Auction

by Stephen J. Gertz

Call it Ishmael.

Today, June 22, 2011, Bonham's - NY is auctioning Herman Melville's travel desk. Those wishing to harpoon it will have to lay out a lot of blubber. It is estimated to sell for $20,000 - $30,000.

This brass-mounted mahogany traveling lap-desk dates from the third quarter of the 19th century. Its rectangular top opens to a hinged brown velvet-lined writing surface with fitted compartments and a pen well. The lid interior possesses a red leather folio with brass securing clips, and the writing surface lifts to reveal a storage well and removable guard concealing three secret drawers. The sides have brass bale handles.

Enclosed within the desk are a gilt-metal-mounted agate snuff box, two small pen knives, one inscribed "E M Marett," a molded glass inkwell with associated cap, a pair of tweezers, a glass intaglio seal engraved "EMM," and a gilt-metal and mother-of-pearl pen.

 

The interior of the lid is mounted with caricature prints, and two period small yellow sheets inscribed "Our Box at the Post Office is 1162" and "Herman Melville / 104 East 26th St / New York" respectively.

Herman Melville came into possession of this small writing desk through Ellen Martha Marett Gifford, whose name is inscribed on the pen knife and whose initials are engraved on the glass intaglio included among the desk's effects. Gifford (d.1889) was Elizabeth Melville's cousin, a life-long correspondent of the Melville's and, later in life, the couple's benefactor.

In 1886, aided in part by a generous gift from Ellen and by inheritances from Ellen's mother, Martha, and Elizabeth's brother, Lemuel Shaw, Jr., Melville was able to retire from his long-held position at the New York Custom-House. In his final years, he privately published two volumes of poems: John Marr and Other Sailors (1888), and Timleon (1891); and began Billy Budd which he worked on until his death.

Melville found time to travel in his retirement and it  appears, from the presence of his ownership labels, that the desk traveled with him. He fortuitously avoided the Great Blizzard of 1888 when he journeyed abroad to Bermuda (returning by way of Florida); and the following year he spent a fortnight with friends in Savannah.

Melville occupied the house at 104 East 26th St. from 1863 until his death in 1891.

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6/26/2011 UPDATE: Sold for $34,160, incl. buyer's premium.
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A Bookshelf Made by FDR, Woodworker

by Stephen J. Gertz

A homemade, portable wooden bookshelf made by Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 32d President of the United States, in 1925 will be auctioned at Boomsbury-NY, on Wednesday, December 8, 2010. It is estimated at $3,500 - $4,500.

Made for Marguerite A. LeHand ("Missy"), FDR's companion, personal secretary, and hostess in Eleanor's absence, and carved with her initials and, below, his - "FDR 1925" - it was, apparently, a practical gift for her while the two traveled together during most of 1925, a small (50.5H x 49.5W x 19.5D cm), convenient, on-the-go bookcase. Roosevelt and Missy spent long hours on trains, traveling between Hyde Park, Manhattan,  Warm Springs, and his houseboat in Florida.

FDR had been a hobbyist woodworker in childhood. In 1921, when he contracted polio and remained at Hyde Park, the family estate in Duchess County, New York, to recover, he returned to it to fruitfully pass the time and cope with the physical challenges of his infirmity. Eleven years later an article appearing in Craftsman magazine in 1932, stated "Mrs. Roosevelt is not the only woodworking fan in her family.  Her husband, Governor Franklin Delano Roosevelt, follows it as his hobby to give him relaxation from his strenuous days in the state house at Albany, New York."

Bloomsbury, in their catalog note, hesitates to declare it as definitively FDR's creation: "this piece was made by FDR or perhaps a local craftsman in Hyde Park."

But there were no skilled craftsmen in Hyde Park; it was a farming community with, perhaps, a handyman for repairs and light projects. There was, however, one skilled woodworker close to Eleanor Roosevelt, Nancy Cross.

In 1925,  Eleanor, Marion Dickerman, and Cross built Val-Kill, a stone cottage on the Roosevelt property that the three shared. A furniture designer as well as a woodworker, Cross made all the furnishings, each of which was monogrammed EMN - the ladies' initials. 

This bookshelf, however, was not wrought with the fine woodworking skill that Cross possessed. And it is highly unlikely that FDR would commission a local to create what was a gift to a close companion with their initials carved into it; there's an intimacy to it that strongly suggests that this was strictly between the two of them. And, significantly,  this bookshelf is small and simple enough that it would not have been an unwieldy endeavor for one  confined to a wheelchair; he could have easily made it, and with much free time at his disposal and his own skill,  why would he not? Those carved initials? If the bookshelf had been commissioned by  FDR the builder would have wrought them with greater skill; they are fairly crude.

Yet the possibility exists that it was made by another and only signed by FDR.

The last piece of strong, circumstantial evidence that FDR indeed made this bookshelf himself, I believe, nails it. During 1925, Eleanor, Nancy Cross and Marion Dickerson established a woodworking shop at Val-Kill to employ the local farmers and teach thier children a craft after the harvest and before Spring. The women had to recruit skilled craftsmen from around the country and Europe as teachers and builders: there were none in the area. In 1926, the woodworking shop at Val-Kill became Val-Kill Industries, creating and selling furniture in the Early American style. FDR had a complete woodworking shop at his disposal.

Provenance on the bookcase is solid: the former property of Anna K. McGowan, Hyde Park, NY; Edgar McGowan was caretaker of the Roosevelt family estate at Campobello Island. It seems likely that they were related to one another.

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Images courtesy of Bloomsbury.
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Chippendale Bookcase, c. 1765, Estimated at $700K-$1M

by Stephen J. Gertz

The Messer Chippendale Secretaire Library Bookcase
99 in. (251.5 cm) high; 79 in. (199.5 cm) wide; 24 1/2 in. (162.5 cm) deep.

Need bookshelf space but Ikea won't cut it? Want to move up into shelving that makes a statement, as in, Lottery Winner!?

In New York, on October 21, 2010, Christies is offering the Samuel Messer Chippendale Secretaire Library Bookcase, a George III ebony-inlaid mahogany art cabinet attributed to Thomas Chippendale, c. 1765, as part of its 500 Years: Decorative Arts Europe sale.

Christies, which originally sold the piece as part of its Messer Collection of English Furniture sale in 1991, estimates it will sell for $700,000 to $1,000,000.

"Of stepped breakfront outline, the central section with imbricated and ebony-veneered swan's neck cresting centered by a platform over a fiddleback mahogany cross-grained frieze, the central door with glazing bars centered by a foliate C-scroll cartouche suspended from husk chairs and within an arch and lozenge tablets, the side sections with pierced hexagon-pattern galleries and later draped urn ebony-inlaid finials over glazed doors of a similar arched and lozenge design headed by a clasp, the three doors enclosing mahogany-fronted shelves, the base with a secretaire drawer fitted with a baize-lined double ratchet easel and two mahogany-lined side drawers (one divided) over three long drawers all mounted with original foliate-cast gilt-lacquered handles, flanked by a pair of cut-corner cupboard doors, the whole inlaid in ebony with stylized foliate scrolls, and broad lines in geometric patterns of cut-corner and circular panels, with ebonized-molded base, the hinges of top drawer stamped H. TIBATS, and labeled G. JETLEY/24, BRUTON ST. BERKELEY SQ. WI, the central platform support and finials later, the underside of plinth with yellow wash over an apparently original red wash" (From Christies' catalog description).

And, unlike Ikea book shelves, no assembly required.

(That catalog note is one of the most  objectively observed, keenly articulate, yet lyrical descriptions that I have read in quite a while. The prose sings, the report enchants,  by the end you're in a trance).

The volumes that could have filled this bookcase in 1765 may likely have included books that were issued in that year, first editions new then but rare books now:

• Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman by Lawrence Stern  (vols. 7 and 8).
• The Fool of Quality by Henry Brooke.
• Works of William Collins.
• The Works of Ossian (James Macpherson).
• Commentaries on the Laws of England by William Blackstone.
• A Complete History of England by Thomas Smollett.
• An Essay on a Course of Liberal Education for Civil and Active Life by  Joseph Priestley.
• Essays by Oliver Goldsmith.
• The Plays of William Shakespeare, edited by Samuel Johnson.
• A Review of Doctor Johnson's New Edition of Shakespeare by William Kenrick.

But I like to think that the very wealthy gentleman of the Age of Enlightenment who originally bought it was one with an interest in Shakespeare and also owned a First Folio, and a Gutenberg. He had an interest in science and so possessed first  editions of  Copernicus, Galileo. and other greats. Early printing fascinated him; he had an eye for incunabula.

If those books come with the bookcase at the Christies sale bump up the estimate a few million or so.
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When Bookends Become Works Of Art

 Albanico Bookend by Seth Rolland.

These bookends, capturing the leaves of a book in flip motion, are carved by furniture designer Seth Rolland from - amazingly - a single piece of wood.

"For many years now I have been experimenting with the dramatic, fluid and graceful forms that can be created by cutting one piece of wood most, but not all the way through and then expanding it.  This method has led to clean, honest forms where the structure is the ornamentation.  As you can see from the photo above, it is still one piece of wood.  Open it like an accordion and simply connect it to make a useful, strong, sculptural bookend. You can order them from me or get them at the Bellevue Art Museum in Washington, the Museum of Arts and Design in New York, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Santa Barbara Museum of Art, the San Francisco Museum of Craft + Design, or The Gallery on Bainbridge Island" (Seth Rolland).

They are made from sustainably harvested ash, are 11” x 2” x 11” high, feature a non-toxic, oil-based finish, and are $120 each, $240 per pair.
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The Leaning Bookshelves of Deger Gengiz

Trained as an architect, Deger Gengiz has professionally worked in architecture, archeology, and industrial design for the past twenty years.

While he creates functional, versatile, and affordable pieces, he continues to explore the boundaries between conceptual art and experimental design.

His work has been published in several international architecture books and included in the permanent collection of the Red Dot Design Museum.

 His most recent creation, the Cactus Chair, is an experiment investigating the effect of visual data to the user's experience. The existence of the Barrel Cactus is temporarily discomfiting, even though the user knows that the cactus underneath them is not likely to leave evidence of its existence on their butt.

Glass shards are another matter.

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Images courtesy of Voos Design.

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