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Bow Back Windsor Arm Chair
Bow Back Windsor Arm Chair
Bow Back Windsor Arm Chair

Bow Back Windsor Arm Chair

Maker
Period1800 - 1820
MediumMaple, pine, and ash
Dimensions39.5 × 21.75 × 20.25 in. (100.3 × 55.2 × 51.4 cm)
SignedBranded on the underside of the seat, "S. JAQUES."
ClassificationsSeating Furniture
Credit LineMuseum Purchase, 2003
Object number2003.5
DescriptionNine turned and tapered spindles extend from the shaped seat to the bow of the back of this Windsor arm chair. Another spindle supports each of the arms, as does a bamboo turned post. Four bamboo turned legs are braced by two bulbous turned side stretchers that are connected by a simple dowel turned medial stretcher. The arms tenon into the bow back. They also have a distinctive scroll cut into the front arm terminals.
Curatorial RemarksThis bamboo turned bow back Windsor arm chair is the second style in which its maker Samuel Jaques worked. See accession number 2017.705 for an example of his earlier baluster turned products. The basic form of the chair derives from Delaware Valley work. Jaques interpreted the Philadelphia crowned bow face with a single outside groove, and his forward placement of the bow ends on the seat creates awkward voids at each side of the back. The arm's attachment to the bow is unusual. Rectangular tenons pierce conforming mortises at shallow rabbets cut into the bow face. The slender arm rests terminate at the front in tiny scrolls of distinctive profile. In Philadelphia work the small platforms behind the scrolls cap curved supports rather than bamboo turnings, as here. In contrast to the chair's substantial Philadelphia influence, the large horseshoe shaped seat, which merely suggests a shield form at the front, relates more to early nineteenth century New York plank seats. The combination of New York and Philadelphia features comes as no surprise as New Brunswick, where Jaques primarily worked, was located on the main travel route between the two cities. For more information about Windsor chairs made by Samuel Jaques, see Nancy Goyne Evans, American Windsor Chairs (New York: Hudson Hills Press in Association with the Winterthur Museum, 1996), 184 - 185.NotesSamuel Jaques (1764 - 1828) was a Windsor chairmaker from New Brunswick, Middlesex County, who may have also worked in Monmouth County. His family had lived in Middletown between 1766 and 1771, and perhaps later. For more detailed biographical information on Jaques, see accession number 2017.705.
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