Britisk campaign furniture

Magazine Antiques, August, 2001 by Allison Eckardt Ledes

Every so often an article published in this magazine becomes the foundation for a book or an exhibition. This is the case on both counts for Nicholas A. Brawer, whose two-part article about British campaign furniture appeared in our June and September 2000 issues. His book on the subject was published by Harry N. Abrams this spring, and this summer he is the guest curator of an exhibition on view at the Katonah Museum of Art in Katonah, New York, through September 30. There are approximately one hundred objects on view in Britains Portable Empire: Campaign Furniture of the Georgian, Victorian, and Ed ward ian Periods. They are representative of what officers, gentlemen, and their families took with them when they went off to serve their king or queen in the far-flung reaches of the British Empire from the late eighteenth through the early twentieth centuries. In addition to the furniture, costumes, paintings, and decorative arts objects in the exhibition reveal that life in the British colonies closely imita ted life in London, as can be seen in arecreation of an officer's tent assembled for the exhibition.

British officers were most often members of the aristocracy, many of whom had purchased their commissions, often for extravagant sums. They traveled to faraway places with finely crafted knockdown furniture to create all of the comforts of home. For example, a broadside of about 1806 advertised a dining table to "dine from four to an hundred persons or any greater number," and after the legs were unscrewed from the top, the table folded to the size of a Pembroke table. In style, portable furniture imitated stationaiy pieces but often lacked omamentation such as marquetry, inlays, or elaborate mounts. Design bcoks by Chippendale, Sheraton, Hepplewhite, and Ince and Mayhew included engravings of designs for knockdown furniture.

Furniture that was taken to hot and humid places such as India, Africa, and the Far East was made with the climate in mind. Thus, canvas seating furniture was popular, as were caned chairs, sofas, cribs, and beds. Dual-purpose furniture such as the sofa bed, was also convenient for British travelers and military men.

The paper-cover catalogue of the show may be obtained from the Katonah Museum of Art at 914-232-9555.