Furniture

18th C. Windsor Chair & 19th C. Windsor Rocker

Appraisal: 18th C. Windsor Chair & 19th C. Windsor Rocker

Transcript

GUEST: When my parents bought their first home, my mother wanted to fill it with American, early American antiques.

APPRAISER: And when was, when was this?

GUEST: 1950, 1951.

APPRAISER: 1950. And where, was it right here, in Spokane?

GUEST: No, it was in Los Angeles. I wanted to know their value, because I want to insure them properly. My father always warned me that they were valuable, but that's all he ever said.

APPRAISER: Okay, that's it. No numbers or anything?

GUEST: No.

APPRAISER: First of all, I love Windsor chairs.

GUEST: I do, too.

APPRAISER: Okay. You love them, too? That's great.

GUEST: I have seven at home.

APPRAISER: Seven of them. Well, which one of these do you think is the better chair?

GUEST: I don't know, I mean...

APPRAISER: Which would you pick?

GUEST: I would think this one's older. But I wouldn't know.

APPRAISER: That's older, okay, all right. But you don't have any idea of value comparison?

GUEST: No.

APPRAISER: Okay. Let me just quickly say, this is a lovely oval seat, probably New England. You always look underneath here at the wood, and that looks like white pine. It suggests it's New England because they used a lot of white pine there.

GUEST: Mm-hmm.

APPRAISER: Nice chair that has, that's a rocker. But it's not going to be that valuable, okay?

GUEST: Mm-hmm.

APPRAISER: This little rocker could be insured for about $600. If it had paint, it'd be more valuable. I'm going to slide this rocker back and come over to this one. It's a Rhode Island Windsor from about 1760 to 1770.

GUEST: Oh, cool.

APPRAISER: Okay? And what's neat about Rhode Island Windsors is that there are a group of them with this profile-- do you see this curved profile?

GUEST: Mm-hmm.

APPRAISER: This is the crest rail, these, usually hickory or ash-- because they're bendable-- spindles...

GUEST: Mm-hmm.

APPRAISER: ...come down to this little pillow on top of the seat rail.

GUEST: Mm-hmm.

APPRAISER: You see how it's echoed, this S-curve is also echoed here?

GUEST: Mm-hmm.

APPRAISER: Now, the arms-- I'm going to tip it forward just a little bit. What kind of wood do you think that is? It's a light-colored wood, very hard.

GUEST: I don't know.

APPRAISER: Maple? Maple?

GUEST: Maple.

APPRAISER: It's a wood that they used a lot in Rhode Island. They used hardwoods. This seat, it looks like it's chestnut. That makes sense for Rhode Island. And the wonderful seat with this-- let me just show you this. See that little flair?

GUEST: Mm-hmm.

APPRAISER: Now, that was something that you see a lot on English chairs.

GUEST: Oh, mm-hmm.

APPRAISER: That wonderful little flair that gives it that extra, extra curve. And this fits the bottom quite nicely, right?

GUEST: Yes, it's very comfortable.

APPRAISER: Very comfortable, right? And one of the really nice things about the chair is that the feet are original.

GUEST: Mm-hmm.

APPRAISER: These feet usually get cut off, they turn them into rocker chairs, like the other chair was turned into a rocker. Original feet. It's... I couldn't believe it. I looked very carefully to see.

GUEST: Uh-huh.

APPRAISER: Because they're often replaced. You need to check that, and that takes away about 80% of the value.

GUEST: Oh!

APPRAISER: But these feet are good. So it's a really, really nice chair.

GUEST: Mm-hmm.

APPRAISER: Now, there's one thing that it used to have that it doesn't have anymore. It's missing paint.

GUEST: Paint?

APPRAISER: It lost its paint. Almost every Windsor was painted.

GUEST: Oh, I didn't know that.

APPRAISER: If you look at the bottom...

GUEST: Oh!

APPRAISER: Do you see this? It has the original wash and then the white, the white paint. So this is what stayed, it's like the DNA...