Anyone into classic furniture

[al]

Our Cornish cottage is furnished in mid century furniture.

al.

 

[MattiThundrrr]

On a chaise longue all day long..

Oooh that chrome ball lamp could fit in my life nicely

 

[wynne]

I still do a bit of woodworking for a friend. He's been developing these midcentury handles to retrofit to modern furniture/kitchens etc. They're made from offcuts of hardwoods and ply. Just fitted them to our tired units - they're very tactile and nice to use.

 

[TreaderSteve]

Here’s a piece of Richard Hornby Aformosia furniture. I have far too many in the house. Phone is a Belgian telecom phone I rewired to work on digital networks, sculpture is a Henry Moore, catalogued and authenticated by the Henry Moore foundation, found in a flea market!

Ooh, more (Moore) photos and a story about the sculpture please!

 

[Rothchild]

Does a paperweight count?




I was lucky enough to be able to be offered a site visit through a work contact when it was being refurbished (with very little regard for the Grade 2+ listing, but that's another thread!). This little chunk of Goldfinger loveliness was surplus to requirements, so it came home with me.

 

[pete_mcc]

Ooh, more (Moore) photos and a story about the sculpture please!

I’ve always love Moore, as long as I can remember. I have dozens of books on his works, I have his complete catalogue of sculpture and drawings. I particularly love his war time work and his London Underground pictures. I own a few of his prints, a sketch and a few bits of ephemera but the idea of owning a sculpture has always been way beyond my means. There are loads of fakes, replicas, copies or tributes on eBay but that’s just not the same to me.

One day, 20 odd years ago, me and the other half were in a random village when we spotted a flea market. You’ve seen the pictures of my house on this thread, I like junk and tat so I was drawn to the flea market like a fatty is drawn to KFC. As we were wandering around, we saw a tatty little sculpture on a table..’Supposed to be ‘Enry Moore’ said the stall holder, and it did look like it was trying to be Moore.

For what ever reason, I decided to buy it. It was relatively cheap at £49, but we bartered him down to £30 as it was the end of the day and he’d had it for a while and it was chipped and damaged:

What was interesting to me was that most sculptors make maquettes, miniature sculptures, out of terracotta to test out a form and to show to a client before making a full size version. This was terracotta. They are often covered in a heavy duty glaze to protect them and to allow bronze maquettes to be cast from them. This was glazed that way. Interestingly, mine had splashes of bronze and knife marks on it.
However, the thing that suggested this was not a Moore was the stamp on the base. It clearly said ‘SP’.

So I set about researching what this could be. The internet was not so good back then and google image search and AI didn’t exist so it was all manual. I looked first in my catalogue of his works and was amazed to find this;

A bit more searching and I found this:

No.3 looked familiar..

So I wrote to the Henry Moore foundation, more in desperate hope than expectation. They have an authentication committee who, for a fee, will research and validate unknown works. I sent the photos and sat back to wait. Almost instantly I received a response. Half expecting a ‘terribly sorry but this is shit’, I actually got a response saying that they didn’t need to research this as it was already a catalogued piece!

Turns out that after the war there was a movement to get art in to schools. Artists like Lowry, Picasso and Moore all provided prints that could be hung in schools so kids would be surrounded by art. You can still buy them today:

https://www.goldmarkart.com/collect...pRLhkoW1j2yjf_vOayqUpiOeGxJBXoIUch_X82FpA_Hnu

What was less well known is that the organisation responsible for getting prints into schools went back to Henry Moore and asked if they could get his sculptures into schools. Due to the work involved he was less keen, however provided a couple maquettes that could travel around schools. These were stamped on the base with the initials of the organisation - School Prints, or SP. Sadly the concept of these travelling round never really happened and Henry Moore didn’t really engage with the project any further.

The maquettes then disappeared. One remained with the Moore Foundation:
https://catalogue.henry-moore.org/o...86713a21541bad950c9d9bfdb39a2702dea06e2&idx=0

My one had, apparently, ended up at a foundry where it was used to make a mould for bronze versions, hence the knife marks from where the mould was cut free, and the bronze splashes from years in the foundry.

Another is in the V&A

One of those ‘once in a lifetime’ things and it’s never going to leave my possession!

 

[Tayside]

In other news, my more than adequate partner is taking me to Copenhagen next week.
I have never been before and was looking at the Design Museum as being one of the places to visit.
Yay or Nay?
Oh and the Copenhagen Card keeps popping up on reviews, has any one used it?
We will be there for 5 days but staying in Malmo, so I had wondered if it would be good for zipping back and forward across the bridge.
Ta muchly

 

[Tayside]

One of those ‘once in a lifetime’ things and it’s never going to leave my possession!

Absolutely, what a fantastic story, thanks for sharing.

 

[pete_mcc]

I still do a bit of woodworking for a friend. He's been developing these midcentury handles to retrofit to modern furniture/kitchens etc. They're made from offcuts of hardwoods and ply. Just fitted them to our tired units - they're very tactile and nice to use.

Loving those so much

 

[TreaderSteve]

Pete, that's bloody marvellous! What a spot! A lovely little piece. I heard about the art in schools project a couple of months ago - must have been Youtube I imagine. I'd never heard of it but like you say 'big' artists were involved.
Antiques Roadshow with it next year?!