What Is Queen Anne Style Furniture?
Queen Anne style refers to the English Baroque furniture style that was made popular during the reign of Queen Anne, who ruled England from 1702-1714. The furniture style was born during the Georgian period, known as the Golden Age of furniture making, which lasted for almost one hundred years in the early 1700′s. The timeless designs were originally made famous by such popular furniture designers as Thomas Chippendale, George Hepplewhite, and the Adams Brothers. But, interestly, Queen Anne never designed furniture herself. She was interested in the arts and commissioned artisans to design furniture that would blend with the elegant and complex tapestries and murals that decorated her royal living quarters. Most Queen Anne style furniture was fashioned from mahagony wood, but satin wood was also a popular choice.
Thomas Chippendale
Perhaps the most famous of the Queen Anne style furniture designers was Thomas Chippendale. Born in Youkshire, England, Chippendale learned the furniture trade from his father, but went on to eclipse his father as a writer, designer, wood carver and furniture manufacturer. Chippendale was famous for combining sturdiness with graceful elegance, and he probably best known for his famous ladder-back chairs.
George Hepplewhite
While Thomas Chippendale was a master wood carver and created many of his furniture pieces by hand, his contemporary, George Hepplewhite, designed and wrote about furniture but never actually made furniture by his own hand. He established a furniture factory in London, and his furniture creations bore the same claw foot design as Chippendale. But he departed from his peers by eschewing the thick heavy designs that earlier defined the Queen Anne period. He favored slender, more delicate, lines for his furniture pieces, and often featured the shield of armor in his designs.
Adams Brothers
The Adams brothers entered the world of English furniture design in the mid-18th century, right when England was deep into the war with the American colonies. For this reason, we don’t see much of their influence in early American furniture pieces. Led by Robert, the more enterprising of the Adams brothers, their work reflected the classical Roman influences that they studied while attending schools in Italy. Bringing their designs to England, they employed Chippendal and Hepplewhite to interpret their ideas and manufacture their designs. Unlike their peers, who preferred mahagony almost exclusively for furniture manufacturing, the Adams brothers favored the use of satinwood, which was available only as an import from the West Indies. Consequently, their furniture pieces were expensive and available only to the most wealthy English patrons.
Today, Queen Anne style furniture is designed and made by many of the leading furniture manufacturers such as Henredon Industries,
Drexel Heritage, Stickley, and Thomasville. It is also possible to purchase reproduction Queen Anne furniture at discount retailers such as JC Penney, Walmart, or home furnishing stores such as Crate and Barrel and Pottery Barn. While you can expect to pay less than one hundred dollars per piece for reproduction Queen Anne style furniture, antique Queen Anne furniture is likely to cost ten times as much for a single piece. A complete antique Queen Anne dining set, consisiting of a table, chairs, and buffet could easily run into the five figures if it is in perfect condition. Even a single piece such as an antique Queen Anne sofa, or desk, will likely cost over five hundred dollars, or more for the most famous Queen Anne designers such as Hepplewhite or Chippendale.