Neoclassicism - England - Part 2

Under Adam's influence the bold mahogany carving of the 1740s and 1750s gave way to inlaid decoration and besides mahogany, lighter woods such as golden-yellow satinwood made their appearance. Exotic timbers like the pinkish-hued tulipwood, kingwood and partridge wood were also used on occasions for handmade furniture veneers, with marquetry decoration of Neoclassical designs or flowers in contrasting woods such as sycamore or harewood, holly, box or ebony.

Adam was employed almost exclusively by the rich and fashionable. It was left to cabinet-makers of less lofty aspirations, mostly working in the 1770s and 1780s, to translate his style into more practical terms for the middle classes. Several of them also published design books, and among these George Hepplewhite's The Cabinet-Maker and Upholsterer's Guide is the most famous. It was a posthumous work, Hepplewhite having died in 1786, and it was published by his wife Alice who apparently carried on his cabinet-making business after his death. Not a single stick of furniture firmly attributable to Hepplewhite's workshop has ever been identified, so it is indeed remarkable that this man should have lent his name to a whole period of furniture design. For the 'Hepplewhite style' sums up the range of furniture produced during the 1770s and 1780s. Restrained in its Neoclassicism and practical in its design, furniture of this period was, generally speaking, more graceful and refined than at any other time in the history of English cabinet-making.

The preface to Hepplewhite's Guide reveals the publisher's aims - 'to unite elegance and utility, and blend the useful with the agreeable... to produce a work which shall be useful to the mechanic , and serviceable to the gentleman... and convey a just idea of English taste in furniture for houses'. This latter objective was an allusion to the popularity of English fitted and non fitted furniture abroad: by the late 1770s, a great deal was being exported, especially to the Netherlands.

The preface also mentions the country cabinet-maker 'whose distance from the metropolis makes even an imperfect knowledge of its improvements acquired with much trouble and expense'. This was a time when provincially made furniture was becoming less and less distinguishable from that made by London cabinet-makers, and many firms based in other cities produced up-to-date furniture of a high quality. Such design books as Hepplewhite's must have been extremely helpful in disseminating knowledge of the latest designs.