Luke Beckerdite
Architect-Designed Furniture in Eighteenth-Century Virginia: The Work
of William Buckland and William Bernard Sears
During the eighteenth century, architects occupied a socioeconomic position
higher than master builders, house joiners, and other artisans in the
building trades. Many leading British architects, such as William Kent
and Robert Adam, were tastemakers who designed landscapes, buildings,
and a broad range of decorative arts for the nobility and wealthy merchant
elite. Horace Walpole noted that Kent was “consulted not only for
furniture . . . but for plate, for a barge, [and] for a cradle. . . .
So impetuous was fashion that two great ladies prevailed on him to make
designs for their birthday gowns. . . . One he dressed in a petticoat
decorated with the columns of the five orders; the other like a bronze,
in a copper colored satin with ornaments of gold.”1
Colonial American records occasionally refer to builders as architects,
but most of these individuals were tradesmen, entrepeneurs, or gentlemen
esteemed for their technical expertise, ability to oversee a workforce,
and basic knowledge of classical form and detail. Few were architects
in the strict sense of the word, and fewer still ventured into other areas
of design. Perhaps the most notable exception is William Buckland (1734–1774),
a talented individual whose designs for public and private buildings and
furniture in Virginia and Maryland justify his claim to the title architect
(fig. 1). Because Buckland’s
career as a builder is adequately discussed in several books and articles,
this article will focus on his furniture designs, on the artisans that
executed them, and on the architectural context of the furniture.2
Buckland was born in the parish of St. Peter’s-in-the-East, Oxford,
England, in 1734 and trained as a joiner by his uncle, James Buckland
of London. His apprenticeship, from April 5, 1748, to April 1755, coincided
with one of the most dynamic periods of British furniture and architectural
design. From 1720 to 1750, Palladian classicism dominated almost every
aspect of design. To create harmonious decorative schemes, architects
and cabinetmakers designed furniture and other decorative artifacts along
architectural lines. A side table design by William Jones is representative,
having a frieze with a scrolling fret and bead-and-reel and egg-and-dart
moldings (fig. 2)—classical
architectural details appropriate for the friezes of stair landings, door
and window entablatures, and chimneypieces. The large pendant shell, florid
leafage, masks, and heavy scrollwork represent a synthesis of the Palladian
and baroque styles. Jones and many other designers of the time supplemented
their ornamental repertoire with details derived from late-seventeenth-
and early-eighteenth-century Netherlandish, German, and French designs.3
The baroque style largely was out of fashion when Buckland began his training,
but the classical tradition and the concept of furniture as an extension
of interior architecture remained in vogue. During the early 1740s, the
naturalistic ornaments favored by the adherents of Andreas Pallado (1508–1580)
evolved into the rocaille and cocaille forms, exaggerated scrollwork,
and jagged leafage of the rococo style that was at the time termed “French”
or “Modern.” While an apprentice, Buckland saw the rococo style
expand, encompassing Chinese and Gothic elements. Thomas Chippendale’s
The Gentleman and Cabinet-Maker’s Director (1754), published
in the final year of Buckland’s apprenticeship, was the first British
furniture design book to integrate successfully the seemingly disparate
tastes of the rococo style.4
If Buckland’s career is any indication of his training, he had a
thorough knowledge of classical architecture and of the practical aspects
of building prior to his arrival in the colonies. He also understood the
nuances of French, Chinese, and Gothic tastes and their application to
furniture and architectural design. All of this knowledge he applied in
his first commission.
On August 4, 1755, approximately four months after his apprenticeship
expired, Buckland signed an indenture with Thomson Mason of Fairfax County,
Virginia, agreeing to serve Mason or “his Executors or Assigns in
. . . Virginia” for four years “in the Employment of a Carpenter
&. Joiner.” In turn Buckland received free passage to the colonies,
food, lodging, and an annual salary of £20 sterling. Thomson Mason
acted as an agent for his older brother George, a prominent northern Virginia
planter who had recently begun building a house later called Gunston Hall,
“a substantial brick mansion, 40 by 70 feet,” bounded by the
Potomac River and Pohick Creek about ten miles south of Alexandria (fig.
3).5
Although the exterior walls of Gunston Hall probably were complete when
Buckland arrived in November, it is likely that he designed the portico
on the “south front” overlooking Mason’s formal garden
and the river (fig. 4).
The portico closely resembles a garden temple in William Paine’s
The Builder’s Companion and Workman’s General Assistant (1758).6
Both designs are based on a hexagon and have Doric friezes, broad engaged
pilasters, and Gothic arches. Only in England and her colonies was the
Gothic taste an important component of the rococo style.
The floor plan of Gunston Hall is similar to many other five-bay Virginia
houses. On the first story there is a wide central hall that extends from
front to back, accommodates the stair, and provides access to four rooms
of approximately equal size (fig. 5).
Both the hall and the southwest parlor are almost completely within the
classical tradition. The hall has a Doric entablature and fourteen engaged
pilasters, two of which act as imposts for elliptical arches. Functioning
as a support for the floor at the top of the stair, the arches have keystones
with toed back moldings, a large pendant drop, and carved spandrel appliqués
(fig. 6). The tattered
leaves of the appliqués are in the rococo style, but most of the
surviving carving in Gunston Hall is relatively naturalistic and more
akin to British work of the 1730–1740 period. This naturalistic style
is most evident in the carving on the stair brackets and in the southwest
parlor (figs. 7, 8).
The southwest parlor is the most ornate room. The windows, doors, and
cupboards have Doric pilasters, entablatures, and pediments (cupboards
and doors), and they are decorated with intricate frets, carved appliqués,
and “leaf grass,” egg-and-tongue, and rope moldings. Cupboards
of this type probably derived from Roman aedicules, or sculpture niches,
and like their ancient prototypes, the keystones on the Gunston Hall cupboards
probably supported ceramic vases or busts (fig. 9).
Buckland’s acute understanding of classical form and detail was the
result of his training and his familiarity with published designs. His
estate inventory included fifteen architectural design books, furniture
design books, and builders’ guides. He probably purchased most of
the books before immigrating, but at least four were published after his
arrival. Buckland frequently borrowed designs from these sources. The
acanthus appliqués on the windows and doors in the southwest parlor,
for example (fig. 8),
are based on the crossette appliqués in plate 75 of Batty Langley’s
The City and Country Builder’s and Workman’s Treasury of
Designs (1740), a book he owned.7
Buckland’s treatment of the northwest room reflects the eighteenth-century
fascination with the Orient (fig. 11).
Passion for the Chinese taste was well established in English architecture
before Buckland’s move to Virginia, in part owing to publications
such as William Halfpenny’s New Design’s for Chinese Temples,
Triumphal Arches, Garden Seats, Palings &c. (1750) and George
Edwards’ and Matthew Darly’s A New Book of Chinese Designs
(1754). However, there is no design in these books that precisely matches
Buckland’s treatment of the windows and doors, which suggests that
he was either working from memory or simply borrowing conventional “Chinese”
details, such as scalloped cresting and imbricated consoles, from published
sources. The only book in Buckland’s library with similar details
was Chippendale’s Director (see fig. 16).8
For the execution of his designs, Buckland relied on local artisans, and
a suit for back wages brought by journeyman joiner James Brent against
Buckland provides information on the tradesmen in his crew. On July 6,
1763, Brent presented to the court a detailed list of his delinquent wages
and expenses incurred on Buckland’s behalf, including “371/2
days work at Colo. Masons” in 1761 and a “Pare Shoes to Bernard
Sears” in 1759. Sears’s son, Charles Lee Sears, reported that
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his fathers passage to
Virginia was paid by George Mason, who claimed his services until
the amount was claimed by labor. In his spare moments, he practiced
wood carving. When the time of his service was about completed, Mr.
Mason noticed some of the carved pieces of wood. . . . He employed
[Sears] . . . to do the carved work in Gunston Hall. |
Although it is doubtful that William Bernard Sears was a novice carver
when Mason first employed him, other aspects of this oral tradition are
confirmed by Sears’s obituary, which stated that he was “a native
of England” and that he “lived for a considerable time in the
family of George Mason of Gunston.”9
The designs of the carved moldings, appliqués, and other ornaments
in Gunston Hall probably represent the collaborative efforts of Sears
and Buckland. Buckland undoubtedly furnished Sears with working drawings
and selected engravings from design books; however, Sears was entirely
responsible for their interpretation in wood. His carving style is so
distinctive and, in many respects, so unconventional that it is as identifiable
as a signature. For example, the large husks (or bellflowers) on the spandrel
appliqués and stair brackets have tiny, lancet-shaped “eyes”
(folds between the individual lobes of the leaves) rather than the more
typical U- or tear-drop-shaped openings, unnecessarily complex edges,
and deeply fluted and undercut lobes (see figs. 6
and 7). In many instances,
the carving appears uncertain and labored-over rather than “workmanlike.”
Buckland and Sears also worked together on a side chair, one of at least
four made for Gunston Hall (fig. 12).
Several details on the chair are related to a design for a Chinese chair
in the first and second editions of the Director (see fig. 14).
Although far from being identical, the relief-carved fret on the legs
of the Gunston Hall chair and the pierced fret represented in the engraving
have Gothic arches with tiny trefoils, pairs of confronting C scrolls,
and lozenge-shaped strapwork. In addition, both chairs have brackets with
opposing C scrolls. The scrolled ends of the brackets on Mason’s
chair are virtually identical to those on the stair brackets (see figs.
7 and 13).
Sears shaded both with a very small U-shaped gouge, and he used the same
tool to cut short paired flutes in the hollow of the large scrolls on
the chair brackets. Similar paired flutes are on the tattered leaves of
the spandrel appliqués and “leaf grass” moldings above
the pendant and on the door casement at the entrance to the southwest
parlor (figs. 6, 10,
13).10
A subsequent owner converted the side chair to an easy chair, and in all
probability, the crest rail and splat of the side chair were already severely
damaged or missing. The seat rails were planed to accommodate a board
seat, but the adaptive use does not necessarily account for the heavy
planing visible on the inner edges of the stiles. Repairs and alterations
on eighteenth-century chairs often are the result of a sitter falling
over backwards. Normally the splat breaks out of the crest rail and shoe,
and the stile tenons break out of the crest rail. If Mason’s chair
had a splat that attached to the inner edges of the stiles, the stiles
may have been damaged enough to warrant planing. Chippendale illustrated
several chairs with splats attached in this manner, most of which were
“Gothic chairs” and “Chinese chairs” with fret backs
(fig. 14).11
The structure of Mason’s chair indicates that the joiners working
under Buckland’s direction were unfamiliar with the construction
of seating forms. In fact, certain aspects of the construction resemble
house joiner’s work. The materials are unusually heavy—the leg
stock is 21/8" x 13/4", and the rails are 11/4" thick—and
the joints are marked with Roman numerals as on the framing members of
eighteenth-century houses.12
Two other products of Buckland’s shop are shown in an early photograph
of the northwest room (fig. 15).
Mounted on the west wall are remnants of two ornamental canopies, probably
for the display of ceramics (see the reproduction canopies in fig. 11).
Rabbets on the edges of the backboards suggest that they had small scrolled
trusses like those flanking the door friezes below. The roof boards shown
in the photograph appear to be original; however, they probably had nailed-on
scalloped moldings that complemented the design of the doors. The ceramics
rested on the protruding central section of each door head, so the entire
ensemble functioned as an architectural version of the small cabinets
capping several china cases in the Director (fig. 16).13
Most of the interior work in Gunston Hall was completed when Buckland’s
indenture expired in 1759. On November 8, 1759, Mason wrote the following
recommendation on the back of Buckland’s indenture:
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William Buckland came to Virginia
with my Brother . . . who engaged him in London and had a very good
Character of him there; during the time he lived with me he had the
entire Direction of the Carpenters &. Joiners Work of a large
House. . . . I can with great Justice recommend him to any Gentleman
. . . & I think him a complete Master of the Carpenter’s
&. Joiners Business both in Theory &. Practice. |
Mason’s endorsement and social connections probably helped Buckland
secure other commissions. One year later, Buckland received £93.2.0
from Truro Parish for unspecified work on the new glebe house, and in
late 1760 or early 1761 the estate of John Ferguson paid him £0.15.0
for a coffin.14
Buckland moved to Richmond County, Virginia, in 1761 and settled near
the town of Warsaw. On December 6, 1761, Buckland purchased large quantities
of lamb, mutton, and beef from John Tayloe, II (1721–1779), a wealthy
Richmond County planter who was in the process of either completing or
remodeling his house, Mt. Airy, and who had hired Buckland to design and
supervise the installation of the interior woodwork (fig. 17).
As at Gunston Hall, the masonry work at Mt. Airy probably was already
complete before Buckland’s arrival. A fire in 1844 gutted the interior,
but the surviving masonry supports and joists in the cellar suggest that
the house had symmetrically arranged rooms, a wide central hall, and possibly
a marble floor. Entries in Tayloe’s account book and lawsuits brought
before the Richmond County Court suggest that Buckland worked for Tayloe
for nearly three years from December 1761 to November 1764.15
A few fragments of carved cornice molding survived the 1844 fire (fig.
18). On these, the leaves
on the ogee molding below the dentil course have undercut lobes and short
parallel gouge cuts, as do those on the spandrel appliqués and
door casement moldings that William Bernard Sears carved for Gunston Hall
(see figs. 6 and 10).
This similarity suggests that Sears joined Buckland’s workforce at
Mt. Airy, a conclusion supported by the very rarity of carvers in eighteenth-century
Virginia, particularly in areas like Richmond County where there were
no large towns to support specialized tradesmen.
Among the many original furnishings that survived the 1844 fire are a
pier table and a sideboard table attributed to Buckland and Sears (figs.
19, 25).
The architectonic form of these tables and their carved details suggest
that Buckland designed them to complement the interior woodwork in the
house, much as he would have learned to do in England. Tables and large
case pieces such as library bookcases were the furniture forms most often
designed by eighteenth-century architects.16
The pier table is the more architectural of the two (fig. 19).
It has massive scrolled legs that derive from large, early-eighteenth-century
architectural trusses (also referred to as brackets and consoles), some
of which have acanthus carving and deep, toed-back molding on the front
face and strapwork and husk or acanthus carving on the sides. The central
shell-and-acanthus ornament on the table is relatively underscale, but
as with other Buckland designs it has precedents in British architectural
and furniture design (compare figs. 2
and 19).
The materials and construction of the table suggest that it was built
by Buckland’s house joiners. The legs are made of mediocre stock
3 1/2" x 5"—dimensions suitable for rafters, purlins, minor
floor joists, and studs—and have deep checks on the back edges, particularly
where they are notched to help support the rails (fig. 20).
The joiners used a saw with a relatively thick blade to cut the rail tenons
and mortises for the three cross braces under the top. The shoulders of
the tenons are cut at a 45-degree angle to abutt the angled faces of the
notched leg stiles. The mortise-and-tenon joints are secured with glue
and large wooden trunnels (pegs), some nearly 3/8" in diameter (fig.
21). (In conventional
furniture joinery, mortise-and-tenon joints are either glued or glued
and pinned with small trunnels.) Glue and large wrought finish nails attach
the rail moldings and shell-and-acanthus appliqué (fig. 22).
These nails would have been quite visible when the table was new. The
rails and narrow boards with carved gadrooning form a shelf for strips
of figured cherry that frame the marble top (fig. 21).
Apparently the joiners miscalculated the dimensions of the marble, since
they chopped out rabbets in the front and back rail after assembling
the frame and chiseled rough bevels on the adjoining edges of the marble
top. The joiners also made the table too low, an error that they corrected
by adding 11/2" blocks under the foot plinths (fig. 19).
(The two original blocks on the rear legs are fastened with four large,
rose-head nails that are set in counterbored holes.)
In designing the pier table, Buckland repeated several motifs that he
used in Gunston Hall. The strapwork and husks on the sides of the legs
(fig. 23) are enlarged
versions of those on the keystones in the southwest parlor (fig. 9).
On both there are stippled grounds, strapwork, floral volutes, and acanthus
husks with stems that end abruptly rather than flow back into the volute.
One can envision the table standing in a room where its ornamental details
are repeated on the trusses and keystones of major architectural components
(i.e., door and window entablatures, cupboards, and chimneypiece).
The carving on the pier table is more workmanlike than most of the carving
in Gunston Hall. With conventional “eyes,” subtle convex and
concave surfaces, and delicate shading flutes, the acanthus leaves on
the table legs are more naturalistic in appearance than those on the stair
brackets and keystones in Gunston Hall (compare figs. 9
and 24). Although the
quality of Sears’s work improved with time, he continued to use many
unconventional techniques. He cut short paired flutes on the convex lobes
of the shell and on the acanthus leaves, strapwork, and back edges of
the legs of the pier table (see figs. 20,
22–24),
on the brackets of Mason’s side chair (fig. 13),
and on certain architectural elements both in Mt. Airy and Gunston Hall
(figs. 6, 10,
18). Sears seems to have
been uncomfortable leaving any surface plain. On the table he used a single-point
tool to stipple the ground on the sides of the legs and around the acanthus
leaves on the front faces (figs. 23,
24); whereas, most of
his contemporaries used gang-punches with four to eight points for stippling.
In contrast to the conservative Palladian style of the preceding example
(fig. 19), Buckland based
his design for the sideboard table on plate 38 in Chippendale’s Director
(figs. 25, 26).
He also incorporated an intersecting circular fret and bold egg-and-tongue
and rope moldings (figs. 25,
27), details used in the
southwest parlor in Gunston Hall (fig. 8)
and probably in the room in Mt. Airy where the table stood.17
In construction, the sideboard table is even more unusual than the pier
table (figs. 28, 29).
In addition to having the moldings and appliqués attached with
large finish nails, the sideboard table has poorly cut haunched tenons
and mortises that are completely open at the bottom. The tenons are glued
and pinned with trunnels only slightly smaller than those on the pier
table (fig. 27). Although
Chippendale had little to say about the structure of his sideboard table
in the 1754 and 1755 editions of the Director, in the 1762 edition
he advised, “Feet and Rails . . . are cut through; which gives it
an airy look; but will be too slight for Marble-Tops. Therefore the Tops
will be better made of Wood.” Tayloe evidently found this structural
incompatibility to be the case. The triangular blocks nailed in the leg
recesses and the L-shaped braces screwed to the stiles and rails probably
postdate the table’s construction by only a few years (fig. 29).18
The carving is unusually fussy for Sears, but it reveals a great deal
about his methods (figs. 30,
31). The near absence
of carving tool marks on the rails indicates that he glued the sawn appliqués
to a board (probably with a paper interface) and carved them before attaching
them to the table. With the exception of the moldings and flowers glued
and nailed in the recesses at the top of each leg, all of the leg and
foot carving is cut from the solid (fig. 32).
Like the circular fret on the front rail, the carving on the table probably
echoed architectural details in the room where it stood. The small husk
just below the egg-and-tongue molding, for example, is very similar to
the leaf carving on the cornice fragments in Mt. Airy (figs. 18,
30, 31).
Carving also links the sideboard table to a Gothic-style table that may
have been among the original furnishings of Mt. Airy and that belonged
to a “Miss I. T., [of] Virginia” when it appeared in the “Riddles
&. Replies” section of Antiques in March 1943 (fig. 33).
Minute details of the carving are not discernable in that illustration,
but the husks, scrolls, and acanthus leaves on the front rail are remarkably
similar to those on the rail of the sideboard table (see figs. 30,
31, 33).
Several of the scroll volutes have small leafy wings like those adjacent
to the circular fret of figure 25.19
Buckland based his design for the Gothic table on elements for a French
chair illustrated on plate 17 in the first and second editions of the
Director (fig. 34).20
Faint color shifts on the legs of the table suggest that it had applied
rosettes (on the circles between the piercings) where the Director
engraving shows a small husk. Buckland’s occasional reliance on the
Director for furniture designs is logical, considering that he
lacked formal training as a cabinetmaker.
The only other known piece of furniture with a possible connection to
Buckland’s shop is a fretwork sideboard table illustrated in Wallace
Nutting’s Furniture Treasury (fig. 35).21
The legs appear to be constructed in a manner similar to those of figure
25 (see also fig. 32).
To recess the frets, the joiner planed a wide groove in the face of each
leg before sawing out the design. Most furniture frets are based on flowing
or repetitious patterns, but those on the rails of figure 35
have a static quality reminiscent of eighteenth-century railing designs
and a scale more suited to architecture than furniture.
Buckland and Sears probably parted company soon after completing their
work at Mt. Airy. Between April 1765 and August 1768, Sears was in or
near Loudoun County, Virginia. Buckland remained in Richmond County where
his shop continued to produce furniture and architectural components.
He described himself as a “Joiner & Cabinett Maker” when,
on April 2, 1765, he took John Randall of King George County, Virginia,
as his apprentice. The following February Robert Wormley Carter wrote,
“Buckland this day brought home my Bookcase cost £6.0.0 also
put up my Chimneypiece of carved work, £2.10.6 . . . also a plan
of a house £1.1.6 . . . this Plan he drew some time agoe.”
John Tayloe also may have referred to furniture from Buckland’s shop
when he informed Landon Carter that “8 chairs and 2 elbow ones .
. . are in Buckland’s hands to sell.”
On March 25, 1771, Buckland wrote Robert Carter:
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I have long hopd for an opertunitie
of being imployed (in the way of my Profesion) in some jobb under
yr. Honr. . . . I have now some of the Best Workmen in Virginia among
whom is a London Carver a masterly Hand. . . . Should yr. Fondness
for Work of that kind and Drawings induce you to call in I shall ever
Remember the Honr. done me. |
The following November, Buckland, his London carver, and at least three
other tradesmen from his Richmond County shop moved to Annapolis to complete
the construction of a house that Edward Lloyd IV had recently purchased
from Samuel Chase.22
In a November 7, 1772, letter of attorney to Benjamin Branham, Buckland
described himself as an “Architect.” This was the beginning
of a new phase in Buckland’s career, one in which he hoped to exercise
fully his talents as a designer. Unfortunately Buckland died twenty-five
months later, and the interior of the Chase-Lloyd house and the exterior
of the Mathias Hammond house are the only documented work surviving from
his Maryland period. As with the furniture and interior details he did
with Sears, these important buildings show that Buckland was indeed one
of colonial America’s greatest architects.23 |