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.

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I thought I’d share two photos of Herter Brothers pieces from my recent Philadelphia Museum of Art trip. You’ll have to excuse the photography as it was with a camera that was foreign to me and since the Herters’ pieces were behind glass, I think it created some challenges for the auto-focus.

The first photo shows a Herter Brothers half-tester bed and a side-char.

The next photo shows an inlaid table attributed to Herter Brothers.  You can see the bottom left corner of what is a large wall mirror that I should have photographed, but the camera was running out of juice.

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I heard from Jennifer Zwilling at the Philadelphia Museum of Art on the Thomas Brooks attribution basis for this sofa I recently posted about.  I thank Jennifer for taking the time to respond and to do so with the amount detail that she did.

I have not yet followed up on the information that she provides, namely to look at the Brooklyn Museum pieces, but I thought I’d pass her response onto Rare Victorian readers in the meantime.

Dear John,

Thank you for your interest in our collection. The sofa you saw in our gallery (along with the rest of the double parlor suite in our collection) was attributed to Thomas Brooks upon its accession in 1972 on the basis of its similarity to a set at the Brooklyn Museum. The Brooklyn Museum’s set is attributed based on a bill of sale from 1872 and a label on the back of the mirror from a marble topped chest of drawers which was a gift from the same family. That set is similar, but not identical to the PMA’s.

There is always room in an attribution for further research and questioning. Two parlor sets very similar to ours have come up in recent sales at Neal Auction and Cowan’s Auction; I don’t believe either have firm documentation. Less similar sets exist at the Newark Museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the High Museum, the Dallas Museum, the Bush House in Salem, OR, and the Munson-Williams-Proctor Institute. These are all attributed to John Jelliff.

As no identical suite has come to light (as far as I know) with existing documentation to any maker, research continues.

It is always nice to hear from an interested visitor, please feel free to email with any further questions.

Best Regards,
Jennifer

Jennifer Zwilling
American Decorative Arts
Philadelphia Museum of Art

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