The latest meeting in the series of Research in Progress took place on 13 March 2021 via Zoom. As with the previous two themed meetings, (Sixteenth-century Furniture and The Regional Chair), speakers presented current research from a variety of perspectives. The sessions may be viewed on the RFS YouTube channel.
A bit of lockdown amusement: a group of Early Modernists are engaged on project examining and writing about the everyday cultural lives of the middling sort 1560-1650. They have come up with a Social Status Calculator across the various statuses from ‘new gentry’ to ‘dependent poor’, with some biographies and information about real people in those days.
There’s a piece about furniture by Chris Pickvance too!
This talk by Julian Parker may be found on the RFS’s YouTube channel here.
This painted East European chest, probably Romanian but possibly Hungarian, is in need of a new home. It is 3ft 3in wide, 1ft 10in deep and 2ft 9in high (99cm x 56cm x 84cm). Members who went on the Transylvanian trip in 2012 will remember seeing similar examples. This type of chest was still being made in the 19th and 20th centuries.
The owner, Jill Robson, would be happy to pass it on as a gift to a suitable home. She does not want it to go back into the trade.
Any member interested in acquiring the chest should contact Jill Robson on 01433 620350.
This month sees the publication of Claudia Kinmonth’s keenly awaited Irish Country Furniture and Furnishings 1700-2000 (pp. 550 illus 448., Cork University Press). Following the Society’s Irish tour last year and as a thank you to the RFS for its support for the book Claudia has arranged a special 20% discount from the publisher for RFS members on the RRP €39.00 or £35.00 (plus p&p.), valid until the end of December. The book will also be available from good bookshops by about 20 November 2020, and online, usually free of postage, from Book Depository. To order a signed copy from the publisher, email: maureen.fitzgerald@ucc.ie and quote the code ‘RFS’. Signed copies must be ordered before 31 December 2020. Listen to Claudia’s recent interview on BBC Radio Ulster (at 26 mins 40 seconds into the programme). For more information please check Claudia’s website and her Twitter.
The Regional Furniture Society visited the Butter Museum in Cork during its visit to Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic in September 2019. The film below was made by the Butter Museum as part of a conservation project. The explanations of butter-making are by Dr Claudia Kinmonth, author of the book Irish Country Furniture. A revised edition of the book is being published by Cork University Press. Claudia received a grant towards the production of this book from the Society.
The index of all the pieces which have appeared in the Newsletters has been updated for the most recent issue No 73.
William Sergeant has pointed out to me that in my own piece about chairs in Lincolnshire wills and inventories the links in the Newsletter piece are tricky to navigate.
The links below should remedy the issue:
1532 to 1534: early references to chairs in Lincolnshire Wills
1663 – Bishop Sanderson’s Flagg-Bottomed Chairs and Other Stories
1665 – Inventory of John Brooke, Chair maker of St Martin’s Parish, Lincoln
1691 – Inventory of William Botamley, Chair maker of Gainsborough, Lincolnshire
1696 – Probate Inventory of John Dring of St Peter’s in the Arches, Lincoln 4th December 1696
1705 – John Ashton late of Spalding in the County of Lincoln, chair maker – Inventory
1718 – 1729 The comparative value of an early 18th century Windsor chair
Julian Parker
Website Editor
Regional Furniture Volume 34 will include an article about the chest in St Martin’s Church, Hindringham, Norfolk.
Johann von Katzenelnbogen in Maryland has an interesting blog which mentions this chest and also has a clever piece of detective work on mediaeval woodworking tools, starting with a stained glass window in the cathedral at Chartres.
Watch this space …
This article describes a plain Spanish chest which has had gothic carving added in recent decades. John Andrews’s book British Antique Furniture: price guide and reasons for values (ACC, 1989, p. 162) illustrates a larger chest which has been later carved in a very similar style of gothic carving.
There are various estimates of the original dates of such chests, from sixteenth to eighteenth century.
Regional Furniture Society members will be interested to learn that Tim and Betsan Bowen have just published The Welsh Stick Chair – a visual record (Pethe Press 2020). Welsh-speaking members and those learning Welsh will be delighted to discover that the volume is bilingual with the text in Welsh and English next to each other. The authors have used images of the chairs, stools and tables which they have photographed over many years as dealers in Welsh vernacular furniture. Their aim in producing this book is to extend the knowledge and appreciation of these important items of the Welsh folk art tradition. The book is available here. A review will appear in the Newsletter in due course.
Regional Furniture Society 
You must be logged in to post a comment.