Antiques Answer Man
Antiques Answer Man, Wayne Cameron--award-winning columnist-- answers your questions about antiques and fine art in the following articles. Feel free to read through them! They will be updated regularly. We would appreciate your feedback.
Desks and Dustballs
Nothing says class quite like an early-to-mid 19th century solid walnut desk set atop ball and claw feet, with ample drawers and a large leather inset top. You know, the kind seen in an important executive office on the top floor of a downtown high-rise. You might also see it in the office of an upscale antiques dealer, flanked by prestigious gilt-framed paintings and precious objets d'art under a glass dome.
In reality, however, most executives today work within the confines of a simulated walnut laminated press-board desk delivered by big-box, office-supply retailers. Antiques dealers, like me, often work off a somewhat shaky "antiqueish" table in a corner, cluttered with all manner of books and accoutrements. So, where do these elegant examples of workmanship reside? If you can learn how to spot them, you might find out.
Antique desks can take many forms, from impressive, heavily carved exotic hardwood examples to humble, small pine single pedestals with somewhat dubious newer pulls, a replaced leg or a drawer with one broken corner. Yes, they can be that varied-double or single pedestal, drop-front, slant front, lap, bureau, pull-out, secretary, bonheur de jour, roll-top, davenport, cylinder, fold-up and partners, as well as tables with drawers commonly called library and writing tables. These unique qualities can often be matched by even smaller detailing like novel configurations of drawers, legs, pigeon holes and secret compartments. Construction materials add to this diversity. Most commonly, you will find walnut, mahogany, maple, oak, rosewood, cherry and pine.
Each style of desk can boast its own attributes, but generally speaking, each example conforms to several important functions. They must offer a good solid writing surface, be it humbly waxed or more impressively, either leather-covered and gold-embossed or beveled marble. Also, its drawers and compartments must offer habitation to all kinds of communication tools like pens, pencils, paper clips, tape, ink, blue and the list continues. Antique desks like the secretary or bureau drop-front may offer long drawers for clothing and linens or provide shelves for books. Considered more of a hybrid, this style continues to be conventionally recognized by most people.
Over the years, I have had a few impressive desks. One featured black ebony with gold detailing and stood in my home hallway for a number of years. Another walnut leather-topped, ornately carved with claw and ball feet stood upstairs in a bay window for a time as well. I still get a sore back when I think about it. Today, however, my needs have reduced to more basic forms. I just use two tables that offer a large, "clutterable" surface. Like most men, if I need it and can't see it, I get a little insecure. And, besides, it eliminates the need for desk drawers that, we all know, tend to collect those pesky dust balls.
