Sabre Leg Chairs
Sabre Leg Chairs
While variations in quality obviously exist, chairs with sabre legs do not go through the same gradations as previous types, perhaps because the country makers instinctively avoided them, mindful of the structural
weakness implied in the sabre leg, which must be cut across the grain at some point. The scrolling arms, with their wide radius, suffer from the same inherent weakness. As a result, there are some very fine examples and the rest tend to be of good ‘town’ quality of execution. Those with brass inlay are considered the most valuable.
CHAIRS — sabre leg, 1800-1840
A fine quality example with rope-twist top rail and carved decoration. c. 1825
Shows the same features of quality —rope-twist, etc. — with the addition of brass inlay. c. 1825
The thickening of the back top rail and the slightly heavy legs and arm supports suggest a provincial origin.
c.1830
An interesting carved key pattern decoration in top rail. c.1820
A much broader top rail than the previous chair with leaf form carving. c. 1825 The heavy rail is gadrooned at the top but brass inlay is clearly visible. c. 1820
Probably about the simplest form of period sabre leg chair in mahogany, unpretentious and pleasing. c. 1825
In contrast to the previous chair this one has gone rather towards the Victorian, in the exuberance of its carved top rail which has hints of the early balloon-back. c. 1830
A Regency sabre leg library step-chair in its open and closed positions. This type produced by Morgan and Sanders, c.1810 and illustrated in Ackermann’s Repository of Arts, 1811.
Tags: brass inlay, CHAIRS, heavy legs, leaf form, leg, mahogany, Sabre, side, twist