How do you choose appropriate furniture for a heritage home?

Before going out to choose furniture for your heritage home, several points must be considered: the architecture and prevailing style of the home, the era in which the house was built, and the degree to which you want to emulate the past. Regardless of the size of the project, every designer or decorator must choose a year or era as a benchmark when restoring older homes.

Last fall we traveled to the southern United States and stayed in a historic hotel in Selma, Alabama. Although the hotel was built in 1745, the design team chose the 1860’s as their benchmark decade. This was for a few reasons: 1) Furniture from the 1700’s was not readily available in the numbers required by a hotel, and what was available was prohibitively expensive. 2) Furniture and accessories from the 1860’s were more relevant to our experience due to the popularity of Victorian décor, thus more easily converted to modern standards. 3) The designers chose to recreate the ambiance, not a museum replica of the era. They used reproductions where required, such as beds.

In an example closer to home, I had the opportunity to decorate a restored 1911 brick building into a bed and breakfast. It was used as a rooming house / apartment throughout most of its life. I chose the year 1920 as my benchmark. The décor was inspired by, not copied, the Victorian era, the arts and crafts movement and the early 1920’s. Much of the reasoning behind this choice had to do with the availability of furniture. Victorian furniture was available for the special, more expensive pieces. Arts and crafts inspired furniture worked perfectly with the architecture and era of the building. 1920’s furniture was plentiful, thus less expensive – a definite advantage when dealing with a budget.

Mixing a number of styles, woods and eras, sometimes in the same room, requires knowledge of basic design principles. A common thread must exist between the pieces and their environment otherwise the room will appear thrown together. I use the issue of formality versus informality. In some bedrooms, an informal, masculine feeling was created by pulling together oak arts and crafts pieces with rustic pine. Other rooms might contain the more formal mahogany or walnut bedroom suites in C1920’s Queen Anne style. Color schemes were chosen to harmonize with the wood tones in the room.

Certain furniture pieces are more difficult to adapt to today’s lifestyles. For example, double beds are unsuitable for many people, except perhaps for a guest room. – However, there are creative ways to render these pieces usable. An oak ice box may become additional kitchen storage, a marble top washstand can be used as a bar… an armoire becomes an entertainment unit…A good imagination helps! One note of caution:If at all possible, keep the pieces as intact as possible when retrofitting your antiques in order to maintain their value.

Most of us acquire our furnishings over the space of several years. We continually go through the process of discarding some and keeping our favorites. The past was no different. The year you choose as your benchmark will serve as the latest year in which the furnishings would have been bought. Feel free to choose pieces from earlier eras. If the ambiance is more what you crave, rather than authenticity, choose reproductions in conjunction with antiques. Do some research on furniture styles to familiarize yourself with what best suits the look you are trying to create. Check out antique stores, shows and auctions to determine what is readily available, and what you can expect to pay for your heart’s desires. A buying plan is a good idea.

Antique lovers will tell you that the hunt is worth as much as the treasure - so, enjoy the process and the rest will come together in time!

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