I’ve been examining furniture, looking for alterations and out and out fakes for many years. However, in the past few years, it seems to me more and more pieces are turning up with alterations that aren’t being mentioned when the items are sold. One reason might be there are fewer old pieces to go around. Also, it seems more folks are looking for antique furniture than there used to be. This combination has had two major effects, higher prices and more fakes noticeable at shows in shops and at antique co-ops. Because of this, I’m seeing an endless supply of altered furniture. Sadly, I’m examining pieces in private homes that were purchased as right as well as seeing many in the marketplace that turn out to be fakes.
One Cupboard, Many Changes
An interesting cupboard recently was brought to me. The owner wanted a door and feet added. To me, that’s half of the cupboard. She had been told it was an 18th-century piece with rotted-off feet and a door missing. The statement was partly correct; the feet had disappeared and there was no door. However, it was made in the mid-1800s and has been altered considerably since then. She had bought it at a farm auction, as is. The auctioneer’s sales pitch had sold her on the piece. I don’t know if he ever knew the facts or not, but she had overpaid for some old lumber that resembled an open cupboard with shelves.
When I initially saw the first piece, I didn’t know what to look for. However, my eyes were drawn to the top of the styles where they met the rail. The styles have been cut back about 1/2” to extend the rail. I’ve seen this done a few other times. Usually, they’ve been cut back this way to hide screw holes in any other evidence of the piece once having had a door. But in this instance, the hinge cutouts were still in the recut stiles. On the right side, there was evidence of a latch of some sort on the left stile. Therefore, the cutting had not been done to hide hinge marks. On the contrary, it seemed they’d been cut to allow the use of a new door that was about an inch wider than the opening between the uncut stiles had been.
The shelves were also a puzzle. There were dados cut into the case sides to support shelf ends, but the shelves were now between the dados and were thicker than the width of the grooves. The owner was told the shelves had been moved; that may be. However, these were not the original shelves. They should have been about one inch longer than the width of the inside of the case, so they would fit into the dados. Strips of wood have been nailed to the insides of the sides to support the present shelves.
Also, they were full-width, running from the inside of the stiles to the back. Yet, the dados came to within about four inches of the front. No question that the shelves had been both replaced and removed.
She told me the auctioneer had pointed out that the cupboard had a dovetailed body. The top was dovetailed into the sides, but that was the extent of the dovetailing. The bottom was rabbeted into the sides. I looked at the dovetails and understood why the dados had fallen short of the front by four inches. The dovetails are spaced about two inches apart. However, there was an added piece approximately four inches wide behind the stiles. This was the same as the distance the dados were short on the front. There were no dovetails in this four-inch piece. Since the space between the dovetails was about two inches, there should have been at least one in that piece. Then I noticed the four-inch piece was a different pine from the rest of the case. The original parts were a clear white pine, while the added section was a grainy one with lots of knots. The red paint had about the same tone. Therefore, the piece had been painted after the added depth and cutting of the stiles had been done.
I felt the cupboard once had been the depth of the dados indicated and what the sideboards and tops suggested. The front stiles and rails were also original. However, at some point, the facade had been removed and four-inch pieces added for depths, the original shelves taken out and replaced by thick ones and the front put back, then a new door was added. Why?
That’s hard to guess. But the why doesn’t matter. What does matter is she had purchased a piece, which would be so costly to properly restore that she ended up using it as storage shelves in her country kitchen. These were expensive shelves. I corrected the shelves and cleaned the unit for her but didn’t add feet. Hopefully, she has learned to listen to her instincts, not the person trying to sell an item. Also, she said she’d look a lot more closely the next time she sees something she likes.
Married Secretary
It sometimes is difficult to be invited to a private home by a person who wants to show off a recent buy, only to have to tell him that he purchased a reworked or fake piece. Most folks who hire me or know me personally know that to ask me is to open themselves to the truth as I see it. Not long ago, a friend invited me to visit, so he could show off his new cherry secretary. The moment I saw it, I knew it was wrong. The top section was wider than the bottom one. This could be noticed only when looking at it straight on. We measured and found it was one and one-half inch off. He asked if that was correct. I told him I didn’t think so. Then I began to examine the secretary closely.
It was a good marriage. The pieces had been united by a good woodworker. Both were made of cherry with poplar as a secondary wood and a little pine also used in the lower section. Both cases were well made. The bottom unit, sitting on nice feet, had a drawer over two doors, the top had two doors. All of the doors had the same type of recessed panels chamfered on the rear. The lower section had a top board with some overhang. The upper unit sat on that board. The color of the cherry was a good match since the piece had been refinished. However, I could see proof of the marriage once I began looking beyond the surface.
The chamfers on the door panels had not been done by the same cabinetmaker because the method of planning was different. Also, the insides of the panels in the upper section had a little pink paint in the end grain of the champers. This odd color probably had come from the restorer when he tried to hide white paint with cherry stain. In any case, the insides of the bottom door panels had no evidence of paint, either pink or white. The stiles and rails of the top doors were 3/4” thick. While those on the bottom were 7/8”. If the two sections of the piece had been made in the same shop, the wood thickness of all the doors would have been the same. Also, the top door stiles were about 1/8-inch narrower than those of the bottom doors. Again, these should have been the same if all the doors had been paneled in the same shop.
Although all of the backboards were poplar, the bottom ones showed some rough saw marks, even though most of them had been planed away. That was fine. However, the top boards had been playing much more carefully leaving no saw marks, which was unusual. Also, there were more nails in the upper section than in the lower to hold the same number of boards in place. All of the nail heads neatly matched, meaning both sections had been made around 1840.
The secretary was very nice looking, but it was a marriage. My friend had not been told that. I know the shop where he found the piece. It has a wide range of antiques and collectibles and is a group shop with five or six dealers. Therefore, I don’t know which dealer had owned it. My friend decided to tell the shop owner what he found out about the secretary. He didn’t want to return it because the piece looked great where he had it. He only wanted the seller to know what had been done to this piece.
This is more proof that you must look over an item very carefully before you buy. In the case of my friend, he saw the secretary and really liked it. He has many pieces of cherry throughout his home. So, the fact it was cherry influenced his decision about buying it. Generally, he doesn’t make many mistakes. However, I think here his emotions got in the way. When you’re looking at something to buy, be careful your emotions don’t cloud your visions.
A Tale of Two Cupboards
A lot of buyers of country furniture like pieces in paint. Fakers know that, too. Therefore, as a buyer, you have to beware. I know several folks who won’t buy a painted piece until a professional has examined it for them. However, there are too many others who buy painted furniture without examining it very closely or using their common sense.
I was shown a simple tall two-door cupboard and asked what I thought of the paint. It was a nice yellow over an old red. With one glance, I could tell it was a fake paint job. The crackles were too uniform, but the main thing that stood out was the total lack of wear. Whoever had painted it, apparently wasn’t trying to fool anyone who knows old furniture. For those who either didn’t know or care. The cupboard looked nice from a distance. The piece looked like it could have been made a long time ago or last week.
The painter had taken an old cupboard, sanded it then added antique paint. There are various ways of aging paint, but it usually looks fake if you check closely. Fake paint jobs look best from a distance. The inside of the case was clean. The piece probably dates from around the mid-1800s. Everything about it was right except the paint. Since paint can be removed, the cupboard could be refinished without devaluing it any further than it already has been. The only problem I saw was no one mentioned that the paint was original or even old. That always bothers me as a buyer. It’s all the more reason for you as a buyer to look at everything very closely.
I saw another cupboard at the same time in an old red. This also was a two-door unit.
However, it wasn’t as graceful or as tall as the first. The paint had been done recently. But the person who had painted this cupboard was trying to fake it. There was excessive wear in places the painter thought there ought to be. One of the clues that the paint wasn’t old was the brush marks left where the paint stopped, allowing bare wood to show through indicating where but when paint has been worn away from usage. We generally don’t see brush marks left behind.
Another mistake the faker made was in securing the door. The right door had a locking device dated from about 1870. It was around the same age as the cupboard and might have been original. At least it looked right for the piece. The left door was locked from the inside. Again, that would be correct for the cupboard. However, what was out of place was a turn-lock at the top of the right door. This finger had been made recently and had the same color of paint on it. Fake wear was around the lock.
In addition, its edges were much too sharp for having been used much. Why would the door have two locks? Whoever had done the work probably wanted the piece to look more country. He knew if he removed the metal lock, there would have been a hole where it had been set into the stile. So rather than trying to patch and hide a hole, he decided to add the top lock.
That combination of poorly faked paint and the extra lock should have warned anyone who knows about furniture that something was wrong with the cupboard. There were two red flags. Again, you cannot be too careful, particularly since there aren’t enough real antiques to go around. If you want honest pieces, be prepared to examine any items you find.
