Inlaid Armchair

Craftsman Workshops

1903-04 (ca.)

43 ½ x 24 ½ x 22 inches

Oak with pewter, copper, and fruitwood inlay

1999.60.1

Gift of Anonymous Donor

Shop mark (decal) underneath left-hand side armrest

Stickley's adoption of inlaid furniture represented a departure from the heaviness of his earlier Arts and Crafts furniture and an embrace of conventionalized ornament sympathetic to Art Nouveau aesthetics. Announced in the July 1903 issue of the Craftsman, inlaid furniture was intended to be "lighter in effect and more subtle in form than any former productions" from his factory. That the introduction of these forms was concurrent with the brief employment of architect Harvey Ellis, whose depictions of interiors included inlaid furniture, has been traditionally used to attribute these designs to him, though more recent scholarship has questioned these assumptions. Indeed, interiors drawn by LaMont A. Warner and Claude Bragdon also featured inlaid pieces and the very nature of a larger enterprise like Stickley's (and the negotiations between various departments and stakeholders) argue for a collaborative effort in which a single artist's hand is impossible to sustain.

This model was published in “Structure and Ornament in The Craftsman Workshops,” The Craftsman 5 (January 1904): 391.

George H. Jones (manufacturer of inlay)