What do quality factory furniture makers use for a finish these days?

[Dave Balderstone]

I think I'd want to see it in situ.

Seems to me the surroundings and lighting would make a big differnece for a piece like that.

[Mark & Juanita]

That I will grant you. I've seen that approach for attachment in FWW a number of years ago (think they were advocating it for upper half of a china cabinet) and was really impressed with the idea.

The dresser isn't too bad either, esthetically (IMO). The treter buffet lines and angles neither flow well nor do they blend together in a harmonious manner. Of course, that's my opinion, peoples' idea of esthetically pleasing differs widely, so others may find it a thing of beauty.

+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+ The absence of accidents does not mean the presence of safety Army General Richard Cody +--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+

[Joe Gorman]

Email him about it. I'm sure he'd be wiling to loan you one for a few years to see how it fit in with your other furnishings;-) Joe

[Leon]

Peoples' idea of esthetically pleasing.... Ponder that. LOL.. A good friend whom I often work with had a job in an affluent neighborhood. The decorating was questionable in the customers house. The probably 6,000+ square foot house with large spiral staircase, wooden floors with a 10' diameter raised step floor in the middle of the living room surrounded with

6, 10" diameter columns going to the 12' tall ceilings gives you an idea of the styling of the home as you enter through the front door. I found that odd but the furniture at the entry way was bizarre. First thing you see are 3 over stuffed art deco style chairs covered in red velvet and between each chair stood equal height penguins in tuxedos holding ash trays filled individually loose cigarettes.

[Hax Planks]

But it remains to be seen how much she will like me moving into her store.

The coffee table I'm making for my mom has about $100 invested in it if you factor in wear and tear on tools, electricity, etc. Labor is huge though.

[Leon]

The higher the labor to cost of materials ratio the more money you make providing you are the labor. Price accordingly.

[Larry Jaques]

On Thu, 24 Feb 2005 20:53:22 -0700, the inscrutable Mark & Juanita spake:

I think I'd like it better in fumed white oak. It's reminiscent of the Liberty sideboard which I liked but wouldn't want in my home. This is similar:

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[Ed Clarke]

it to a table. At the time these were made I think that opium and cocaine were legal. Is this design an Arts & Crafts example of the result of recreational drug use?

[Larry Jaques]

On 26 Feb 2005 00:00:26 GMT, the inscrutable Ed Clarke spake:

I'll see if I can find that nicer Liberty sideboard/hutch and email the pic to you. Is that email addy valid?

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[Ed Clarke]

Sure is, send away!

[Mark & Juanita]

Man, Larry, going from bad to worse. I'm sure the craftsmanship is outstanding, but nothing on that piece flows well. The base looks like a reasonably elegant tapered piece was trying to grow, but got crushed by a falling flat table with a shelf on top of it before the base had a chance to mature.

+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+ The absence of accidents does not mean the presence of safety Army General Richard Cody +--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+

[Larry Jaques]

On 26 Feb 2005 04:09:52 GMT, the inscrutable Ed Clarke spake:

OK, sent. I think this one came from a William Morris book.

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[Larry Jaques]

On Fri, 25 Feb 2005 21:35:38 -0700, the inscrutable Mark & Juanita spake:

Let's see what Ed has to say about the other one in the pic I emailed to him. If he likes that one, send your real email addy to one of us and we'll send a copy. (I got sick and effin' tired of fighting spam, pukey ducks, christmas sh*t, and virii in ABPF so I don't frequent it any longer.)

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[Ed Clarke]

The Morris version is a much better design. You can see both the Ugly Liberty Sideboard and the Morris Liberty Sideboard at:

on the links. It's easier to compare if you use Firefox and open both pictures in tabs, or open both in a new window with IE.

The Morris version has a unifying feature with the supports on the side of the table and the display openings on the top shelf. These pieces seem to be designed to go together rather than just having a random bookcase stuck on as an afterthought.

I'm not sure, but the Ugly version seems to have the base door on the right opening as in an oven. The hinges are on the bottom? What's that all about?

The round bulls-eye glass in the center door on the Ugly bookcase part do not seem to be a good feature. You can't see through the bulls-eyes and there's no light behind them so why even use glass? The 4 over 4 glass on the Morris piece let you use the center as a display cabinet.

[Paul Kierstead]

the ugly stick, right down to the uneven height doors.

PK

[Ed Clarke]

I fear that I have to agree. You can polish a turd to a high gloss if you freeze it in liquid nitrogen, but when all's said and done, it's still crap. The Morris piece is carefully crafted ugly. It is, however, less ugly than that first piece of firewood.

So why do I feel so guilty about criticizing Morris? I guess that even he had off days... Here's another one:

guess they're all ugly. Do a google search on images for "liberty sideboard".

[Mark & Juanita]

I kind of agree. The Morris version falls under the category of "not in my house", but I can see some of the features with which some people may find it esthetically pleasing. The ugly version falls under the category of "who on earth would want that thing in their house". You hit on a lot of the things that make the difference, the lack of side supports make the top on the ugly sideboard "disturbing" while it seems to be a part of the Morris design.

That nails another disturbing element; the bottom of the ugly design is disturbingly assymetric and makes the bottom rail appear to be uneven and poorly constructed. That more than likely is not the case, but the design supports the illusion that the bottom rail is not straight.

I'm not sure if it is the bulls-eye glass that is disturbing so much as the proportions between the top and bottom shelves, and the short, wide rectangular dimension of the center door that don't "fit". I'm not sure, but I'm almost willing to bet that the bulls-eye glass wouldn't look half bad on the Morris design.

But then what do I know, I'm an engineer commenting on artistic esthetics :-)

BTW, thanks for posting both pictures, I set up Mozilla in two windows to let me alternate between them.

+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+ The absence of accidents does not mean the presence of safety Army General Richard Cody +--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+

[Mark & Juanita]

Yep, looks like the whole idea of that design was misplaced. Some were just more ugly than others.

+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+ The absence of accidents does not mean the presence of safety Army General Richard Cody +--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+

[Mark & Juanita]

Here's one from that collection that makes the "oven door" model look like it may have been modeled. With the exception of the hardware, everything else is the same as the initially posted ugly guy:

This one's not so bad:

BTW, you were right about the oven door, here's ugly again:

I didn't go through all 124 hits on images.google.com, but of those I did look at, it was kind of funny how many of the pictures were taken outdoors. The settings almost appeared to be alleys, backyards, or garages; sort of like these were things that had been tossed out. :-)

+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+ The absence of accidents does not mean the presence of safety Army General Richard Cody +--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+

[Mark & Juanita]

I meant to say "modified", as in the original was modified later.

+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+ The absence of accidents does not mean the presence of safety Army General Richard Cody +--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+