Periods and Styles
Use style as a starting point, then date the actual materials and construction.
Colonial America
Seventeenth- and early eighteenth-century material culture, regional craft, imported goods, survival, and provenance.
Georgian America
Symmetry, classical proportion, regional furniture, silver, ceramics, textiles, and urban craft traditions.
Queen Anne Style
Curving forms, cabriole legs, pad feet, chairs, tables, case furniture, regional variants, and later revivals.
Chippendale Style
Carved furniture, ball-and-claw feet, pierced splats, regional schools, construction, and revival confusion.
Federal Style
Neoclassical inlay, light proportions, tambour, bellflowers, eagles, urban cabinetmaking, and regional details.
Classical and Empire
Monumental forms, columns, paw feet, figured veneers, New York and Philadelphia shops, and later copies.
Greek Revival
Architectural forms, pillars, scrolls, marble, painted surfaces, clocks, furniture, and domestic classicism.
Gothic Revival
Pointed arches, tracery, ecclesiastical motifs, furniture, cast iron, architecture, and Victorian interpretation.
Rococo Revival
Curving rosewood forms, carved flowers, laminated construction, parlor furniture, makers, and condition.
Renaissance Revival
Architectural cabinets, incising, ebonizing, marquetry, bronze mounts, and urban manufacturing.
Eastlake and Reform
Incised decoration, geometric forms, visible construction, cottage furniture, hardware, and mass production.
Aesthetic Movement
Art furniture, ceramics, silver, textiles, Japanese influence, surface pattern, and maker attribution.
Arts and Crafts
Handcraft ideals, oak furniture, metalwork, pottery, textiles, mission forms, makers, and later reproductions.
Shaker Material Culture
Furniture, boxes, baskets, tools, textiles, community attribution, restraint, utility, and provenance.
Pennsylvania German Traditions
Painted furniture, fraktur, redware, textiles, tulips, hearts, inscriptions, and regional identity.
American Country
Vernacular furniture, painted surfaces, household forms, utility, regional workmanship, and honest wear.
Victorian America
Industrial production, revival styles, parlor culture, new materials, patent furniture, and consumer abundance.
Centennial and Colonial Revival
Patriotic rediscovery, reproductions, revival furniture, collecting culture, and the danger of backdating.
Industrial Age
Machine production, catalogs, cast iron, pressed glass, factory furniture, branded goods, and standardization.
Frontier and Western
Migration, ranching, mining, railroads, trade goods, local craftsmanship, and romanticized reproductions.
Civil War Era Home and Material Culture
Domestic objects, wartime substitutions, soldiers’ effects, mourning, documents, and precise provenance.
Early Twentieth-Century Antiques
Objects from roughly 1900–1926, including Arts and Crafts, early industrial design, pottery, advertising, and household change.