I just received my copy of the December 2008 Victorian Homes magazine (yikes, Christmas trees already) and within the “Antiques” column was this extravagant piece of Victorian furniture, the 12 foot Robinson Crusoe sideboard, which was highly praised at the 1862 London Exhibition.  It is currently being offered for sale by M.S. Rau Antiques.

It was carved by Gerrard Robinson (1834-1891), who at the time was apprenticed to Thomas H. Tweedy who displayed the sideboard at the Exhibition.

Robinson started out on his own shortly thereafter, encouraged by the response to his work.  He created other masterpieces as well, such as the Shakespeare sideboard and the grandest of them all – the Chevy Chase sideboard, which M.S. Rau also had previously listed for $750,000.  According to “History of Furniture” by Michael Huntley, the Chevy Chase sideboard is the most famous piece of carved Victorian furniture in the world.

Unfortunately, as tastes changed in the 1870s and ornate carving horrified the design reformers, Robinson was left to carving pub signs, doing book illustrations, and the occasional furniture piece.  That didn’t discourage his son, William, who also became a woodcarver and whose work is displayed in the Shipley Gallery as well as St. Nicholas Cathedral.

You can see more images of the Crusoe sideboard at the RauAntiques.com site.

I’m encouraged by some of the prices realized at the Fontaine sale yesterday.  Here’s a sampling of some of the healthy results:

• Meeks Hawkins sofa – $10,000
• “Pottier & Stymus” Aesthetic Sideboard – $12,000
• Meeks  Rosewood Etagere – $50,000
• Belter 3-piece Milwaukee parlor set – $21,000
• Pierce-carved Belter slipper chair – $17,000 (expected $6-8k)
• “R.J. Horner” Library Table – $15,000 (interesting side-story)
  

Some of the items had some questionable attributions and the bidders affirmed that message with their bidding:

• Pair of Herter Brothers twin bedsteads – $1,250 for the pair
• Thomas Brooks marble-top table – $1,000

Some items did disappoint and Jelliff items were in that category:

• John Jelliff triple-back sofa – $1,750 (we’ve seen it sell for $5,750)
• Jelliff three-piece parlor set – $2,000

Following on my concern about some of the attributions, the basis of the Pottier & Stymus attribution for the sideboard was:

This piece has a 5 digit number on the back (10278) indicative of the work of Pottier & Stymus

I don’t know about you, but I can’t imagine that P&S were the only makers that had 5-digit inventory numbers of the tens of thousands of shops in the world at the time.

Overall, however, I think the sale showed that the good stuff is still selling well (despite Wall Street tumult) and anything below that level is scraping by.

I’ve been offering an ancillary service here on Rare Victorian called “Special Finds”.  With it, I try to highlight pieces that may be lost in Ebay-land, either mis-priced, mis-identified, mis-categorized, or just plain lost amongst the tens of thousands of Victorian furniture items on Ebay where discriminating buyers won’t find them.

Even if you aren’t in buying mode, the service can be another avenue to follow along as I try to dig deep and identify pieces for what they truly are and who made them.

I provide this limited service as a paid subscription so as to limit the eyeballs on these items because in some cases I’m actively considering being a buyer and I don’t want to have 12,000 co-bidders.  The fee is a reasonable $20 every 3 months or about two Starbucks coffees a month.

Here are the recent big changes from when it was first launched:

• First month is free! I thought I’d provide encouragement for you to try it out without putting up cold cash up front.  You will enter payment information but it won’t be charged until the first month is over.  You can cancel the service before your first payment if you are not satisfied.
• Newsletter format – The Special Finds are now delivered to your email inbox – no need to navigate to RareVictorian.com to a special page and put in a password.  No more logins for Special Finds.
• Signup is simplified – One click of a button gets you to the subscription page

I have the next Special Find identified and it is a Rosewood piece that generally retails for 3x-6x what the current price is.  The seller is unaware of what this piece’s history is usually attributed to as there was no famous maker name supplied with the listing, so it is lost in the ether of Ebay.  But, I have spotted it, and will share it in a few days with Special Finds subscribers.

Note: If you sign up, please be sure to read the verification email instructions that you will receive.  You need to verify your email address before Special Finds will start flowing to your Inbox.

Read more details and sign up here.

Plenty of high-end Victorian coming up in the Fontaine sale in a few days with all the usual suspects: Belter, Roux, Meeks, Jelliff, Baudouine, Pottier & Stymus, and Horner among others.  The Meeks Hawkins pattern set above is expected to bring $35,000-$50,000 and a Belter Milwaukee 3-piece set, $20,000 to $30,000.  A surprisingly unassuming bedstead in the sale is signed A. Roux, which shows you that the best makers of the time absolutely made simplistic pieces for everyday use.

This desk is being attributed to the shop of Allen and Brother of Philadelphia and being dated to around 1875.  I happen to have seen this desk in person – it sat in Adamstown, PA for a number of months and I drooled over the carved griffins on the base, but I couldn’t part with the cash that was being asked for it.

I’m not completely sold on this being by Allen and Brother as it doesn’t fully resemble items that I’ve seen by them before and I think the style of the carved griffins is the reason why it was attributed to them.  The pulls especially don’t say Allen to me but they could have been replaced and I am no expert who knows their full repertoire, anyway.

We’ve seen so many lion-headed griffins from Horner, Mitchell, and Karpen, etc., that we don’t recognize a true griffin when we see one, as is present on this desk.  As a result, the seller identified these figures as sphinxes, which usually have the head of a human, which these do not.  Griffins, going back to antiquity, have the head of a bird; most often an Eagle.

Bidding on the desk will start at $2,000 and the expected range will be $4,000 to $6,000.  More images at the listing.