The furniture mounts of P.E. Guerin

Magazine Antiques, May, 2002 by Barbara Laux

Behind a simple facade on Jane Street in New York City is the luxury hardware business of P. E. Guerin, founded in New York in 1864 by Pierre Emmanuel Guerin (1833-1911). The exquisite details of their metalwork are created through the labor intensive manual process of sand casting and chasing. The pattern room contains a vast collection of decorative hardware models that have been used during the life of the firm. (1) Models for utilitarian pieces such as doorknobs, backplates, and drawer pulls are stored in separate boxes from the models for garland appliques, plaques, and figural mounts. This article is based on a study of 107 of these figural furniture mounts in the pattern room. Each presents unique facial and decorative elements, which makes it possible to identify the corresponding mounts on furniture.

Previous research regarding ornamental hardware on American furniture in the List half of the nineteenth century found that imports from abroad, particularly England and France, were widely distributed in the American market. Charles Hummel noted the lack of evidence for American production of furniture hardware, supporting the theory that the majority of hardware and ornament used by American cabinetmakers was imported from Europe. (2) As noted by Donald L. Fennimore, British manufacturers in the eighteenth century had introduced a marketinging innovation, the trade catalogue, to the industry. The availability of trade catalogues enhanced accessibility to the latest styles and innovations. A number of foreign trade catalogues with histories of American ownership testify to the dependence of hardware merchants on imports from abroad. (3) Historically, metal mounts are particularly difficult to attribute conclusively to any one maker as few are marked, and there is a paucity of extant documentation according t o Pierre Verlet. (4) This has added to the lack of information on the subject.

In 1993 Jillian Ehninger compared early nineteenth-century furniture mounts to illustrations in British trade catalogues and consolidated fragmentary information gathered from various catalogues. Using the early nineteenth-century imported hardware once owned by the Boston cabinetmaker Henry Kellam Hancock (1788-1854), she studied the surviving mounts and drew conclusions regarding materials, workmanship, design, and function. She observed that some designs were copied between manufacturers in the early nineteenth century malting it difficult to assign an attribution to a specific maker. (5)

Nina Gray's 1994 article "Leon Marcotte: Cabinetmaker and Interior Decorator," documented one of the most accomplished nineteenth-century New York City craftsmen. In her review of major commissions, she included furniture that was completed for, among others, the art collector John Taylor Johnston (1820-1893), who became the first president of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. She commented that the cased ornaments for an armchair were "possibly imported from France," but she offered no documentation to support this statement. (6)

The founder of the Guerin firm was born on August 13, 1833, to Emanuel Guerin and Sophie Saint Martin Guerin in Brittany. (7) Pierre Guerin arrived in New York City from Le Havre aboard the Trenton on April 10, 1852. (8) His descendants state that he learned his trade after his arrival in the United States. (9) His name first appears in the New York City directory for 1860 as "Peter" Guerin, a chaser, at 1 1/2 Marion Street. In the same year the New York City business directory lists the partnership of Charles Bertheley (b. 1826) and Pierre Guerin at the same address. This partnership continued until 1864, when Peter Guerin is listed alone as a "Finisher" at the same address.

By 1870 the business, then at 222 Wooster Street, received a credit report from R. G. Dun and Company stating that Guerin, a Frenchman in business for fourteen years, employed fifty men and boys making bronze medallions and other fancy cast goods for use by furniture manufacturers. (10) In 1892 the firm's name became P. E. Guerin when it moved to its permanent address, 21-23 (and 25) Jane Street, where it thrives today under a fourth generation descendant, Andrew F. Ward.

From the beginning Guerin's workshop was able to successfully compete with imports because of the nature of the products. As Ehninger has noted, imported ornamental hardware was frequently sold in sets of twelve," whereas individual pieces with custom finishes could be ordered from Guerin according to the cabinetmaker's specifications.

Guerin's designs and the American marketplace were influenced by France, which dominated design both directly and indirectly, first through trade catalogues and then by Americans' firsthand experience traveling in France. Post-Civil War prosperity created a class of wealthy industrialists eager to establish their status with buildings and interiors emulating French trends. The completion of these projects was realized by an influx of skilled immigrant craftsmen. (12)