In The Cabinet-maker and Upholsterer’s Drawing-Book (the three editions, published in 1793, 1794 and 1802), Sheraton engages the reader for over thirteen pages on the decoration, of all things, a State Bed, but in reference to the two abundantly ornate longcase clocks illustrated in Plate 29, he wasted not one epithet on them, merely stating they “… require no explanations; they are therefore omitted.“

'Clockcases' by Thomas Sheraton, c. 1793.

In his latter years, Sheraton was ordained a Baptist lay minister and yet despite his well subscribed and not insignificant publications, he was a self-assertive, mean and impoverished individual.

The year following the last publication of his Drawing Book, Sheraton made the remarkable claim that longcase clocks were largely out of fashion in all but rural areas and again, omitted them from his 1803 publication, The Cabinet Dictionary.

“… as theſe pieces are almoſt obſolete in London, and having more neceſſary plates to inſert, I have given no deſign of any; but intend to do it in my large work,[1] to ſerve my country friends.” [2]

Normally the pins were withdrawn for reuse once the glue had dried, but occasionally they snapped off – or were simply too short to grab hold of – and were simply hammered home. In the course of restoring veneered furniture of this period, one occasionally sees small black iron/tannin stains on the ground work which mark the site of the veneer pins; or rust stains which witness where the remnants of pins rusted away.

To the untrained eye, pin holes in the veneer surface can blend with the multitude of blemishes and general patina, but when you know what to look for, and in which areas, the small holes become obvious.

A George II walnut chest of drawers, c.1730.

The same image showing the placement of veneer pins.

I had a box of eighteenth/nineteenth-century veneer pins many years ago. The label on the box announced they were “№ 36 Veneer Pins” which I took to mean they were cut from 36 gauge sheet steel. At any rate, they appeared to be guillotined or sheared from thin sheet steel, gradually tapered and square or slightly trapezoid in cross section which assisted them in cutting through the veneer rather than wedging their way through and splitting the veneer. They were exceedingly sharp; even the sides could slice ones fingers.

The last lot of ‘proper’ veneer pins I bought was in the 1970s. They were more akin to heavy duty sewing pins with blued (presumably hardened) round shafts and large heads. They were capable of being struck lightly with a hammer without bending, but they were prone to snapping off when being withdrawn. Their bullet-like tapered points were inclined to split the veneer – especially close to the edges.

The ‘veneer pins’ I use now are sold at my local hardware outlet as “25mm x 1.2mm panel pins” (1″ x 16 gauge). They’re basically very fine bullet head bright wire nails with the same, (undesirable) sharply tapered points. Before use, I hold them vertically on a firm metal surface and tap them with the hammer to blunt the points so they punch their way through the veneer without splitting it.

Prior to mechanised production and the broad availability of veneer pins, cabinetmakers must have relied more heavily on wooden clamps to secure errant veneer, though they were not totally without means with which to affix small mouldings and veneers. Fine steel pins were technically feasible, but not affordable in the quantities required by the majority of cabinetmakers in the seventeenth- and early eighteenth-centuries. The cheap, but impure wrought iron used for general nails lacked the grain structure to produce very fine pins without crumbling. However, the earliest joyners were in possession of technology borrowed from the ship-building and house-framing trades.

Trenails (literally ‘tree nails’) had been in use to attach ships’ planking and for securing drawbored house timbers for centuries and were adopted – somewhat down-scaled – for pegging drawbored joints in joyned furniture and panelling etc. Applied mouldings and backboards are periodically seen attached to early furniture with fine trenails.

Trenails securing small oak mouldings on bed panel, c. 1650.

Trenails used to secure backboards to chest of drawers, c. 1780.

The similarity between these fine trenails and some varieties of thorn, such as those of the Blackthorn (Prunus spinosa), didn’t escape the notice of early joyners.

Thorns of the Blackthorn.

Blackthorns and other species of prickly shrubs produce notoriously tough (and highly injurious!) long tapering thorns, which, after peeling and drying, could be employed on furniture in place of steel pins. Thorns and trenails largely go unnoticed when inserted through mouldings, but, as in the unusual instance of the elm chest of drawers below, can be quite apparent when used to secure the veneers.

'Thorned' veneer on a Queen Anne elm chest-on-stand, c. 1710. (Oliver Charles)

I fixed a straight cupboard lock to the interior of the door and pinned a brass escutcheon over the key hole.

The elm corner cupboard in-the-white.

The exterior of the back, top and base of the cupboard was given a minium wash and the interior was given three coats of a cream-coloured oil-based paint. The show wood was stained and polished and when dry, was given a good waxing.

The cupboard, polished.

The arched panel.

The cornice.

The base moulding.

The painted interior…

… and shaped shelf.

Ready for hanging up.

All fell quiet in the kitchen, so I wandered in to inspect the recent productivity. I opened the fridge and saw some very nice looking tangerine jellies in individual pots; still warm and oh so tangy!

Noticing a small tub on the kitchen bench, I picked it up and read the label. It transpires culinary gelatine is made from pig skin – which got me thinking. I sauntered out to the shed with the gelatine to perform a few experiments. While the glue pot was warming up, I returned to the kitchen to find Virginia stewing some bright red plums and preparing other, pungent ingredients. Upon enquiring what was afoot, I was informed that the tangerines had risen to the top of the jelly (which is apparently unacceptable) and that a second jelly recipe was therefore under way.

“Have you seen my gelatine?” asked Virginia.

This was no time for the truth. “No” I said with as much gravitas as I could muster, “It’s probably somewhere under all that stuff.”  Somewhat panicked yet trying to obfuscate the situation, I asked “Have you finished with my needle-nose pliers? I could do with them right now.”

The pliers had been borrowed some days beforehand to repair an earring and hadn’t been returned. The guilt card worked a charm! As soon as Virginia left the kitchen to fetch the pliers, I slipped back out to the shed.

I had tipped half the remaining gelatine into the glue pot and covered it with water, so I needed to replace it with the same quantity of a similar substance. I have a small electric coffee grinder that I use to levigate urea beads and shellac flakes etc. to assist them in dissolving more readily. I plugged the little grinder in, poured some horse sauce beads into the receptacle and switched it on. Lo and behold! The glue transformed from little golden globules into a pale powder. I quickly tipped some of the powdered glue into the gelatine tub, replaced the lid, gave it a good shake and peered in at my handiwork. Brilliant!

I entered the kitchen moments before Virginia returned, looking befuddled; “I’m sorry” she said diffidently, “I’ve looked everywhere and I can’t find the pliers.”

“Not to worry!” I said (I had retrieved them myself that morning). “Is this the gelatine?” I asked benevolently, holding up the tub of gelatine.

That night for desert we had Spiced Plum and Cinnamon Jelly which was quite the most scrumptious jelly I have ever partaken of, but lawks, was it rubbery! Horse sauce is evidently much more robust than mere pig skin gelatine.

The spiced plum and cinnamon horse sauce desert.

On the strength of how rapturously the Plum and Cinnamon was received, the good wife has vowed to make the jelly again, but with a little less gelatine than the recipe calls for. In light of this pledge, the tub of ‘gelatine’ has disappeared… permanently.

Filed under: Distractions Tagged: gelatine, glue pot, horse sauce, jelly ]]> http://pegsandtails.wordpress.com/2012/01/04/just-deserts/feed/ 10 pegsandtails spiced_plum_&_cinnamon_01a http://pegsandtails.wordpress.com/2012/01/01/happy-new-year/ http://pegsandtails.wordpress.com/2012/01/01/happy-new-year/#comments Sun, 01 Jan 2012 06:33:49 +0000 Jack Plane http://pegsandtails.wordpress.com/?p=4127 ]]>

Health and prosperity to all for 2012!

Moulded frame components.

I ripped a busy elm board in two and rubbed the halves together to make the door panel. When dry, I tidied up the panel and cut it to shape.

The basic arched door panel.

The straight edges of the panel were simply fielded with a plane and the arch fielding was carved.

The fielded panel.

The door frame’s joints were first drawbored and then I knocked the door together and drove oak pegs through the joints, leaving the panel free-floating in the frame.

The assembled door.

The pegs were trimmed and the door given a final tidy up in preparation for hanging on the cupboard.

The Common Holly

The Common Holly (Ilex aquifolium) grows naturally in hedges, woods and forests across Britain and Europe up to a height of twenty-five feet. The bark is smooth and grey and the branches create a tapering outline to the tree.

The small bright red berries are borne from about Michaelmas till after Christmas; the glossy green leaves and red berries now being synonymous with Christmas festivities.

The edges of the thick three-inch long oblong leaves are indented with sharp spines. Indeed, Holly was one of several prickly plants used for hedging-in pastures from the fourteenth-century and particularly after The Enclosure Act of 1773.

A hedge of Holly, thieves that would invade,
Repulses like a growing palisade;
Whose numerous leaves such orient greens invest,
As in deep winter do the spring arrest. [ii]

Holly was a popular wood for floral and geometric inlay work in the sixteenth-century and early seventeenth-century. Whiter than box, holly stood out admirably against elm and oak backgrounds.

“The timber of the Holly (besides that it is the whitest of all hard woods, and therefore used by the inlayer…” [iii]

South Glamorgan oak chest-on-stand, inlaid with holly and bog oak, c. 1730. (Welsh Antiques)

Season’s greetings to one and all.

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[i] John Evelyn, Silva: or, A discourse of forest-trees, and the propagation of timber in His Majesty’s dominions, as it was delivered in The Royal society, on the 15th of October 1662, third edition, volume 1, York, 1801, p. 272.

[ii] Abraham Cowley (1618 – 1667)

[iii] Evelyn, p. 275.

The flat fronts of the carcases normally consist of morticed and tennoned rectangular frames, with the rails partially visible beneath the cornice and above the bottom moulding. However, with this particular piece, the mouldings are situated right on the upper and lower edges of the door opening. The bottom ‘rail’ is only the height of the shallow moulding and is, in effect, merely a packer, glued to the front of the base board to support the moulding. The top rail is morticed and tennoned into the stiles and again, is only the height of the (cornice) moulding.

I rubbed some 1/2″ and 3/4″ pine boards together for the triangular shelves and the carcase end boards respectively. The cupboard’s elm stiles and sides were bevelled where they meet and rebates were planed in the back edges of the sides which will eventually accommodate the pine backboards. The stiles and sides were rubbed together and then I rubbed two glue blocks-cum-shelf supports into the interior angles of each stile/side assembly.

The end boards and stile/side assemblies.

I glued the top front rail into the stiles and glued the bottom ‘rail’ to the front of the bottom board. The top and bottom end boards were then glued and nailed to the stile/side assemblies and finally, the backboards were nailed in place.

The backboards nailed to the end boards.

Bevelled pine shelf supports were glued and nailed to the backboards and the shaped shelves were also nailed in place.

The shelves installed.

The cornice and bottom mouldings were made up and attached to the carcase.

The cornice...

… and the bottom moulding.

The finished carcase.

Further to the removable book stop dilemma which I wrote of in Making a Reading Table – Part One and Making a Reading Table – Part Seven, I have now lived with the reading table for about six months and, when not in use, the whereabouts of the book stop is a constant worry to me and I can’t be having that!

At the time, I entertained a couple of ideas for safely storing the book stop, but all were dismissed as I had no historic evidence to hand of their implementation. That changed recently however when I discovered a mid-eighteenth-century reading table which incorporated one of the previously contemplated solutions.

When not in use, the book stop is stowed on the face of the table by pushing its brass pins into three identical brass sockets to those used for securing it on the tabletop. Hussar!

Note the three brass sockets along the bottom of the front rail.

The book stop stowed on the front rail.

I simply installed three more of the brass sockets into the front rail of my reading table and the conundrum is finally put to rest.

My book stop similarly safely stowed away.

Castors

Table mobility was also discussed in Making a Reading Table – Part One, but I determined not to mount mine on castors. Although not particularly heavy, twisting round to drag the table across the carpet to a position in front of me two or three times a day is neither good for my back, nor the chair I sit in. It is for these reasons I have reneged and installed squat, period-correct, leather-wheeled castors beneath the three feet.

Discreet castors now lurk beneath the feet.

Manoeuvrability has improved, the trade-off being a slight sponginess due to the reduced contact area of the small wheels on the carpet.