Illustrated FURNITURE Glossary
Dressing table
Illustrated FURNITURE Glossary
Dressing table
Federal
By the beginning of the Federal period, what has come to be called the dressing table took the place of the lowboy.
Federal dressing tables are small and rectangular and often have a kneehole; on most, the legs are square and tapered or thin and reeded.
Like lowboys, many of these Federal dressing tables have a plain, flat top. On others, however, a small case of 2 or 3 drawers is permanently mounted at the top rear, providing additional storage space for toiletry articles.
City cabinetmakers often painted or gilded their dressing tables, or hung fine fabric about their bases. Pieces made by rural craftsmen were simpler, typically made of inexpensive wood, then grained to imitate exotic woods like mahogany.
By the late Federal period, the dressing table often included a permanently attached mirror.
This form was immensely popular and continued throughout the Victorian period and into the 20th century. Some of the most interesting examples are in the Art Deco style. Usually made of lacquered wood, these Art Deco pieces have a large round mirror between 2 boxlike sets of drawers.
Other 20th-century pieces are characterized by their use of industrial materials, such as tubular steel and glass. A dresser is a high or low chest of drawers with a permanently attached mirror.
William and Mary styleThe first American lowboys date from the William and Mary period, and it seems probable that, like dressing tables, they were meant to provide a place where toiletries could be stored and applied.
William and Mary examples have one to four drawers and a valanced skirt, and rest on trumpet-turned legs that are braced by flat, scrolled X-stretchers or box stretchers.
- Four dressing tables - Luke Vincent Lockwood, Colonial Furniture in America, 1926
Queen Anne style
- Dressing table -. Dewitt Wallace Decorative Arts Museum, Williamsburg, Va. Walnut and walnut veneer, white pine secondary. Boston, ca. 1740. On display in 2003
Federal styleBy the beginning of the Federal period, what has come to be called the dressing table took the place of the lowboy.
