Herter Brothers
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The firm of Herter Brothers, New York, (working 1864 – 1906), founded by Gustave and Christian Herter, expanding from an upholstery warehouse, became one of the first firms of furniture makers and interior decorators in the United States after the Civil War; with their own design office and cabinet-making and upholstery workshops, Herter Brothers were prepared to accomplish every aspect of interior furnishing including decorative panelling and mantels, wall and ceiling decoration, patterned floors and carpets and draperies.
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[edit] History
[edit] Forefront
The firm was at the forefront of the panoply of furnishing styles that preceded the Mission style: Renaissance Revival, Neo-Grec, Eastlake, the Aesthetic Movement, ebonized "Anglo-Japanese" furnishings of the 1880s for which the firm is best recognized today, and the wide range of furnishings in revival styles required for Gilded Age houses.
[edit] Prominent clients
Among their most prominent clients were the Vanderbilts. Between 1879 and 1882, Herter Brothers decorated William Henry Vanderbilt's new Fifth Avenue mansion.
At 634 Fifth Avenue, in 1880–1882, they decorated the mansion of Darius Ogden Mills, on the site of part of Rockefeller Center now occupied by the colossal bronze Atlas. Their bills came to $450,000 [1]. At the same time they were furnishing the nearby Jay Gould residence at 579 Fifth Avenue, at Forty-seventh Street. During the administration of Ulysses S. Grant the Red Room at the White House was furnished with Herter Brothers furniture. The firm's workshops also provided the heavily carved panelling for the renovated White House East Room during the administration of Theodore Roosevelt. Several pieces of Herter Brothers furniture remain in the White House including a center table and a slipper chair. This center table bears the remains of the only known Herter Brothers paper label; generally the firm stamped their furniture, a common practice in the 19th Century.
[edit] Herter furniture
Examples of Herter furniture are in several major collections in the United States, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. Very few Herter Brothers interiors remain extant. Elm Park, the Legrand Lockwood mansion in Norwalk, Connecticut was built 1864-1868 and partially decorated by Herter Brothers. Open to the public as the Lockwood-Mathews Mansion Museum, the drawing room, music room and rotunda/art gallery are examples of the Herter's interior design schemes, including lavishly carved and inlaid woodwork and frescoed walls and ceilings. The recently restored drawing room retains a suite of Herter furniture purchased for it by the home's second owner, Charles D. Mathews.
An exhibition "Herter Brothers: Furniture and Interiors for a Gilded Age," was presented by the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1995. Its catalogue is Katherine S. Howe et al., Herter Brothers: Furniture and Interiors for a Gilded Age (Harry N. Abrams, Inc. New York, in association with the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, 1994)
[edit] External links
- Barry R. Harwood, "A Herter Brothers library rediscovered" from The Magazine Antiques, May, 2002
- Metropolitan Museum: Library Table for William Henry Vanderbilt
- Michael S. Schneider, "Geometry of a Herter Brothers Cabinet" Geometric analysis of a cabinet, ca,1883
- Herter Brothers Pictorial Histories
[edit] References
- Howe, Katherine S. Herter Brothers: Furniture and Interiors for a Gilded Age Harry N. Abrams: 1994. ISBN 0-81093-426-4.
- Lambourne, Lionel. The Aesthetic Movement. Phaidon Press: 1996. ISBN 0-71483-000-3.
