My uncle's old dresser

by Tina
(metairie, la)

old dresser

I've been redecorating my bedroom and was looking to trade the children's chest of drawers I'd been using for a larger, more grown-up dresser. I looked and looked and didn't find anything I loved enough to spend upwards of $300 on. Finally, I decided I'd just find something that was decent and cheap for the time being. My father and uncle traveled with me to a local thrift store to check one such dresser out and it was a no go. On the way out the door, my uncle offered me his old dresser which was in storage. I, very hesitantly, agreed to go look at it. I was sure I wouldn't like it but he was being so kind. So we traveled to the storage shed and buried under mounds of other things was the dresser in the picture attached. I cleaned it up, replaced a missing drawer bottom with a piece of birch and polished it up. I LOVE IT and I am sure it has to be at least 100 years old, if not older...but am clueless about such things. I have no idea what style this is, what type of wood it is, or what it might be called. If anyone could give me any insights or ways to discover such things, I'd appreciate it.

Thanks to your site, I did examine a few things...the dovetails on the drawers are small and uniform, the fronts of the drawers are not veneers but do appear to be a different type of wood than the insides, there are no labels or years or maker identifiers that I could see and it appears the backing of the mirror has been replaced or reinforced, as the nails are visible and look like they are more modern.

Thanks,
Tina

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My uncle's old dresser

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Empire style?
by: Anonymous

Is what i think, but I am not an specialist.

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Old Dresser
by: Anonymous

I have a very similar one from my grandmother. Found in a barn, stripped at least 15 years prior. I had it professionally refinished for about $800 and it turned out great. Best looking piece of furniture in my house.

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Refinishing
by: Stephane

Hi Tina,

Of what you are telling me, it seems like the overall condition of the dresser is not superb. So basically there is not much you can do wrong because the value of the piece will not be that high.

If you want to start restoring the dresser, make sure you know what you are doing before attempting a DIY repair. I have written a page on how to clean antiques in the "repairing" part of the website. I still have a lot of web pages laying on the shelf about stripping and refinishing antiques. I will make it a priority to put them on the website (hopefully this week still). That way you can use those instructions and pictures to refinish the furniture yourself.

All the best.

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the mirror
by: Tina

Stephane,
Thanks so much for the time you took to reply. It was very informative.

In your reply, you mentioned the mirror screws...so I checked it out. If you remember, I mentioned somehting in my original post about the mirror back being repaired or modified. Well, the modification was because of missing screws. 2 panels were attached to the back of the mirror, and latches were attached to the top panel and the sides of the wishbone frame. The latches look like ones you see on bathroom stall doors when the original latch is broken. Not very nice looking at all...though not visible from the front.

There are no through and through holes on the wishbone frame, so I'm not sure how it was originally attached. It would be nice to remove the rigging and put something closer to what was originally there, but would that just mess things up more?

Also, the top is pretty messed up. A good polishing helps A LOT, but would it be ok to refinish the top?

-tina

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Serpentine front
by: Stephane

Hi Tina, Stephane here.

Nice dresser you have there and congrats with dating it so far. It's kind of difficult to see in the picture what type of wood it is but did you check our page about the antique woods yet? Maybe that could help, just click here.

The problem with dating more recent antique furniture is that they have mixture of different style elements. That is what most furniture factories did in the beginning of the 20th century.

The curved front is called a serpentine front, however in this case it is mixed with a reverse serpentine as well. Serpentine is when only the middle part swells, and reverse serpentine is when there are 2 swollen parts in the front.

The legs are of cabriole form and seem to have kind of a shell design on it or acantus leaf. This and the scrolls that hold the mirror look a little Queen Anne style.

Also check the screws that hold the mirror at the sides and causes the mirror to flip. When those screws have a decorated head, that is often an indication that the furniture has a higher overall value. That are the kind of screws you can fasten by hand. If they are just regular screws (to use with a screwdriver) then the value of the dresser will not be that high.

Anyways don't let the value bother you, just enjoy the piece it's a nice one!

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