Unusual Drawer Design

by Fred Langdon
(Birmingham, AL)

I bought this dresser at a garage sale and immediately noticed this unusual joint design on the drawers (looks like dowels inserted into round holes). An antique dealers told me it was called mortised and was only used in the years 1860 to 1870 because of the difficulty of construction as compared with dovetailing. Is this true and does it add to the value of the piece?

Comments for
Unusual Drawer Design

Average Rating

Click here to add your own comments

Rating

short lived
by: JeffG

You didn't post a picture, but you're describing the first machine-made dovetails. They were cheaper than man-made and were popular for factory-made furniture. But not long after that an even cheaper (and less likely to break down) machine-made dovetail machine was invented, that makes the evenly spaced dovetails like you see in today's furniture. So the round dovetail machines were very quickly replaced and reliably date furniture using them to the late 1800's.

Click here to add your own comments

Join in and write your own page! It's easy to do. How?
Simply click here to return to Antique Dresser Forum