English Dresser

In the late sixteenth century, while wealthy households separated their dining rooms from the large hall and displayed their fine plate and porcelain on impressive court cupboards in their parlours, yeomen farmers moved to brick-built farmhouses with fewer rooms and servants. In their parlours were ’side boordes’ - long shallow tables with a single row of drawers and a boarded base.
By the turn of the eighteenth century these elongated side-tables had found a place in country manor houses. They were elegant pieces of furniture, usually in gleaming polished oak, with shining    handles and escutcheons. In the North of England, they had storage cupboards in the base, either with a central flight of three or four drawers, or with a  central cupboard flanked by two of drawers, made in elm, oak and elm, and sometimes in ash.
In the southern counties, often a separate set of hanging shelves was fixed above the dresser base. In. the North, solid shelves with backs seem to have been more common. Late eighteenth century oak dressers
with fixed shelving    no backs were often handsome pieces. However, by the end of the century, most dressers had been relegated to the kitchen, and by the nineteenth century were made in cheap soft pine as part of built-in cupboards and shelving.
Signs of authenticity
1. Timber of’sides with grain running horizontal, on dressers with frieze drawers only.
2. if dresser has cupboards or drawers, the sides are often in more than one p,)m,d .”o.- extra strength and stabilitv,
3. Simple curving slhope,, to frieze and apron, in wood of matching colour and patination.
4. All parts showing signs of heavy use and wear: build-up of grease and dirt on plate-stays, grooves, top corners of cupboards, around drawer handles.
5. Signs of ‘distressing’ on base boards: dents, scratches, where heavy pots and pans have been dragged over surface.
6. Mortise-and-tenon joints of shelves running through
uprights to show as thin rectangular shapes on the outer surface of the upright.
7. Accumulation of dirt colouring inner surface and underside of top frieze, and on top of dresser shelving*.
8. Deep patination on sides of drawers, marks of knife-points, sharp instruments, on insides of drawers.
9. Bases well-used, with signs of `fraying’ on block feet from damp, knocking with mops and brooms.
10. Dresser shelves and backboards of same-aged timber as base, on to which it fitted.
Likely restoration and  backboards have been added, they are usually of even width, commercially cut timber, wire-brushed down the grain and polished to look old.
12. Whole tops added to dresser bases - may be a period addition or a more recent one, to add value.
13. Added friezes and aprons to increase value - saw-marks can be felt on unfinished underside, timber will not be as hard and seasoned as original timbers.
14. New base boards and inspect closely for other repall-S, such as new underframe.
15. If there are board-backs to bases with frieze drawers, suspect, new legs and aprons where original doors and drawers have been too badly damaged to restore and have been removed.
Construction and materials
In all but a very few pieces, dresser construction lagged considerably behind more sophisticated pieces of furniture, and drawers were made with thick through-dovetails, projecting lip moulding and simple rebate joints reinforced with coarse iron nails from the local smithy. Mortise-and-tenon joints continued to be used with wooden pegs or dowels long after brass screws were common on most furniture. There was probably also a practical reason for this traditional form of construction. In the constantly changing temperature and condensation of the kitchen, with consequent continuous movement of timber. it would have served far better than later methods of construction.
Dressers were made in oak, finely finished and without fixed shelving from c.1690 onwards, sometimes much in the style of contemporary chests of drawers, with fielded and coffered doors, drawers, reeded and mitred mouldings and twist-turned legs or baluster-turned legs. By the early eighteenth century some had well-fitted shelving units with small spice cupboards and grooves or plate-stays.
Between c.1690 and 1710 some grander dressers heralded the shape of sideboards, with a raised backboard, sometimes with shelves or small drawers. From the mid-eighteenth century, shelving above the dresser base became an integral part of the design, though these seldom had backboards.
Reproductions
Nineteenth century
Oak dressers were reproduced during the Victorian period in commercial plank oak, usually stained. Some of the more interesting pieces date from the end of the nineteenth century and were made by the Arts and Crafts Movement as all-purpose pieces of furniture. They are closer to sideboards than dressers in concept.
By the end of the nineteenth century all kinds of kitchen cupboards were built into the large service quarters of Victorian houses, some with glass-fronted doors with cupboards or drawers beneath; some with open shelves and cupboards. Many of these have been neatly converted into ,antique pine dressers’, stripped of their many layers of paint.
Pine
The ubiquitous pine dresser was first made as a built-in piece of furniture destined to be painted from the mid-eighteenth century onwards. By the end of the century it was being made in smaller, more finished versions for use in farm houses and townhouse kitchens.
Price bands
Dresser, with decorative frieze, potboard, turned legs, excellent quality, late eighteenth century, $2,500–4,000.
Good oak with decorative canopy. c.1820, $1,200-1,500.
North Welsh, oak, enclosed, c.1850, $1,500-2,200.
Cottage oak, with potboard and simple legs, c.1820, $900-1.200.
Simple pine, 1840, $.350-450.
Variations
Regional styles
Most dressers were country-made, in varying degrees of skill and craftsmanship. Most interesting are the regional variations, such as the `Welsh dresser’ proper (as opposed to the tridarn and the deuddarn) from South Wales with elaborately pierced and fretted aprons and friezes. Southern dressers without backboards could stand flush against a brick-built wall. North country dressers with backboards stood against rough-cast or stone walls. North Wales dressers often had a pair of cupboards below three frieze drawers in the base, as opposed to the North country dressers with cupboards and one or two flights of drawers.
Countless kitchen dressers were built by the resident carpenters on large estates for all the tenant farms, frequently of a very high standard of design and craftsmanship, often using odd pieces of fruitwood or fine timber left over in their workshops from panelling and boarding from the `Big House’. These may date from the last two decades of the eighteenth century up to the beginning of the twentieth.
Below: North Country pine
dresser, with two fielded panelled doors in the base, and panelled sides. The shelves are tenoned through the shaped side-pieces which support the simply
moulded canopy.

DRESSERS  with shelves, and tridarns
It may seem odd to start a section on dressers with shelves by discussing tridarns, but they are closely linked both in their Welsh origin and in the possibility that the court (short) cupboard had a third layer
superimposed on top purely for display and that this proved so popular that the middle was turned over to display rather than storage which resulted in the dresser. This subject is fully explored in Chinnery, Oak
Furniture, his earliest date for tridarns, incidentally, being 1685, the latest in the nineteenth century.
The tridarns are surprisingly similar in design but in details there is a wide variation. This one has solid sides to the top level instead of parallel straight or wavy slats. It is decorated with contrasting woods and has a well-designed central panel. The back also is closely panelled. It probably dates from the first few years of the eighteenth century. It is at the top end of the quality scale. c.1710
An early dresser. The overhang and the pendants result in it being described as a canopy dresser. Cupboards on either side in the middle section are all that remain of the tridarn design. Probably from Denbighshire in
North Wales. A good piece with panelling throughout except on the back-boards which is normal. c.1 720s
The arched fielded panels of this tridarn suggest a later date for this piece. The top third seems to be gaining in importance at the expense of the middle section. c. 1735
Northern Welsh oak enclosed dresser of six drawers and two cupboards. The drawers cross-banded with mahogany, the plain panelled doors with mahogany inlaid line to the framing. The superstructure of shelves with pine back-boards containing two cupboards, the doors cross-banded with mahogany. The frieze of simple shaping and centrally pierced with heart motif. c. 1780
A magnificent example of an English oak enclosed dresser of architectural proportions, containing two cupboards and three drawers. The doors with shaped fielded panels, and these, together with the drawer fronts, being cross-banded and inlaid. The sides to the base with shaped canted corners and applied pilasters. The superstructure of shelves, unbacked, with central figure compartments, the top finely shaped and pierced frieze under the cornice supported at the sides by applied pilaster supports. 1750
Northern Welsh oak enclosed dresser of six drawers and two cupboards, the door panels shaped and fielded. The superstructure of shelves, with shaped sides, the frieze shaped and cusped. c.1730
An Anglesey, oak, enclosed break-front dresser of six drawers and two cupboards, the doors to which have applied shaped panels, the breakfront with reeded column. The superstructure of shelves has shaped sides,
better quality examples have been seen with reeded columns on the ends and the frieze. c.1780
A Lancashire dresser with applied raised moulding and the drawer fronts cross-banded in mahogany. The superstructure of shelves containing nests of drawers with figure compartment above. The frieze under the
dentil cornice with applied pierced banding. c. 1800
Northern Welsh oak enclosed dresser. The front is inlaid with mahogany forms and ivory escutcheons. The superstructure of shelves is very simple. c. 1850
Anglesey, oak, enclosed break-front dresser. The corner of the break-front has applied quarter turning which any longcase clock collector will recognise. Other examples have split applied double columns at
the ends as well as the breakfronts, and are inlaid with mahogany stars. c. 1850
A large Cumberland oak enclosed dresser. The framed doors to the cupboards with ogee fielded panel doors. The applied pilasters to the front giving the whole architectural proportions. The superstructure of shelves,
containing at the base a row of spice drawers.
A plain example, the decoration is supplied by the reeded support, shelves and top moulding.
Early 19th century
An English dresser, which makes an interesting comparison with 487. The rack arrangement, the reeded canted column supports at the ends, and the applied raised moulding round the door all suggest that it too
comes from Lancashire.
A slightly unusual oak example because of the use made of the fielded panels at the ends of the base and the architectural moulding on the supports, as well as the very wide space between the shelves. The use of
mahogany crossbanding on the drawers indicates a late date.
Late 18th century
A very simple dresser with panelled doors and the traditional six drawer arrangement. The ivory key surrounds are typical of late production.