EXHIBITION QUALITY WYLIE & LOCHHEAD 1860 GLASGOW CHESTERFIELD BROWN LEATHER SOFA

Description

Royal House Antiques

Royal House Antiques is delighted to offer for sale this Exhibition quality Wylie & Lochhead of Glasgow circa 1860 fully restored Hand dyed brown leather Chesterfield sofa

Please note the delivery fee listed is just a guide, it covers within the M25 only for the UK and local Europe only for international, if you would like an accurate quote please send me your postcode and I’ll provide you with the exact price

This piece is absolutely sublime, made by the genius’s that were Wylie & Lochhead. The frame is what’s known as a show frame, they were made for Exhibition’s to show off the skill of the cabinet makers, this one manages to be ornate and elaborate whilst subtle and sophisticated at the same time. It is hand carved in oak, the legs are turned to the front and curved to the rear with the inside back left leg fully stamped and serial numbered. The leather is thick cattle hide, the seat platform a traditional coil sprung affair

In terms of the condition the sofa has been fully restored, the leather has been washed back then hand dyed this glorious Bordeaux brown colour that is exclusive to my leather polishers, the oak frame, lightly washed back and French polished whilst being sure to maintain all the original patina and character

There will be age and use related patina marks as you would hope to find and expect on a 160+ year old piece

Dimensions

Height:- 82.5cm

Width:- 191.5cm

Depth:- 71.5cm

Seat height:- 41cm

Please note all measurements are taken at the widest point, if you would like any additional or specific measurements please ask

Wylie & Lochhead Glasgow, Scotland; furniture makers & retailers (fl.1829-1957)

Robert Wylie began business on his own account in Glasgow in 1817 and in 1828 moved to 80 Trongate, established as an upholsterer and hair and feather merchant. William Lochhead started work in his father’s post-hiring, undertaking and cabinet-making business. Wylie married Margaret Downie in 1824 and Lochhead married her sister, Janet, the following year. In 1829 Wylie and Lochhead formed a partnership as general upholsterers, furnishers and funeral undertakers, and took second floor premises at 164 Trongate.  

Their early success was largely due to high demand for undertakers following the cholera epidemic of 1832 and, with this increased reputation and an eye for new styles and technical developments, their stock of furnishings expanded. The accounts for 1834 showed an annual turnover of £4,438 but by 1844, with two more stores at Saltmarket and Bell Street, the turnover had increased to £30,613. In the 1870s the company was the first of the Glasgow furnishers to specialise in ship and yacht interiors. By the 1880s they had showrooms, factories and warehouses throughout Glasgow (feather works in Dorset Street, upholstery workshop at Mitchell and Unions Streets, paper-staining in Whiteinch and a large cabinet-making workshop in Kent Road with an adjacent carving, gilding and plate-glass silvering works).

Branches were later established in London and Manchester and they had network of agents and buyers throughout Europe and the Empire. In 1882 Wylie and Lochhead employed 1700 people and on 20 August 1883 they were registered as a limited company. George Logan, apprentice cabinet maker in Beith, joined the Wylie & Lochhead in 1882 as a trainee and stayed until 1937 by which time he was chief designer.  Ernest Archibald Taylor was a draughtsman at Scott & Co. Ltd, the Clyde shipyard, before starting with Wylie & Lochhead in 1893/94 also as a trainee designer. As well as training their own apprentices, they employed students from the Glasgow Schools of Art and Technical Colleges. Among these were Jessie King, David Gow and John Ednie. Many of their designers taught at the Glasgow School of Art and the Glasgow and West of Scotland Technical College and acted as local examiners; there was a Wylie & Lochhead prize for furniture design.

The Glasgow International Exhibition of 1901 was an opportunity to show their work with great panache. The exterior of the pavilion was designed by David Gow and the inside by George Logan, John Ednie and E.A. Taylor, who were each given a specific room. The Cabinet Maker and Art Furnisher, August 1901, described the Wylie & Lochhead pavilion as ‘unquestionably the most important furnishing display’ (illus. The Decorative Arts Society 1850-1932 (1985), pp. 8, 10 & 11). They made most of the furnishings for the Exhibition themselves, with carpets specially woven by Alexander Morton & Co. and stained glass made by Hugh MacCullouch & Co. A mahogany bookcase, with stained and leaded glass, mother of pearl, white metal mounts and leather inserts, which was designed in 1900 by Logan for the Rossetti library at the 1901 Exhibition, is now at the V&A Dundee.

Where appropriate their designers incorporated work of other artists and craftsmen in their schemes including cushions embroidered by Ann MacBeth, prints by Rossetti, a large Burne-Jones tapestry and appliqué work in the library and bedroom by Godfrey Blount. A clock designed by C. R. Ashbee was displayed in the Royal Reception Rooms at the Exhibition. However, Wylie & Lochhead was keen to show a brand image and not promote individual designers, so its souvenir booklet stressed that ‘The entire exhibit can be reproduced, if desired, in a simpler or more elaborate type of the same character’. 

The show led to a prestigious commission from Margaret MacConnachie and her husband Robert Hay Coats to furnish, to Taylor’s designs, their new house at 32 Radnor Road, Handsworth, near Birmingham. A more extensive commission which included panelling, fitted furniture and elaborate stained glass, was for the Pollokshields town house of William Weir, later Lord Weir of Cathcart, for which Taylor won a medal and diploma at the 1902 Turin exhibition. The entire 1901 pavilion was selected for display in an exhibition of British Arts and Crafts held in 1902 at the Imparmüvészeti Musum in Budapest and the host museum acquired various items from their display.

At the Turin International Exhibition of 1902 their designers, Logan, Ednie and Taylor, were allowed to exhibit in their own right. Logan exhibited the ‘Rose Screen’, a three-panel screen executed by Wylie & Lochhead, and described in Studio Magazine, 1902 p.99 as ‘a novel treatment of wood, silver, precious stones, and chains of silver strung with pearls and turquoises, the central panel containing a framed drawing by Jessie M King, of The Princess of the Red Rose; altogether a most dainty production’. The screen and a matching desk were purchased by Walter S. Strang, a Scotsman who immigrated to Australia in 1890s, in 1929. Eight years later the desk was destroyed in a fire but the screen was restored and then exhibited in The Folding Image: Screens by Western Artists of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, National Gallery Of Art, Washington DC in 1984 and is in the permanent collection of the Glasgow Museums Collection (E.1986.52).

In addition to exhibition furniture they produced less elaborate ranges of furniture under such labels as ‘Arts and Crafts’, ‘Quaint’, ‘New Art’ and ‘Artistic’, with some pieces available in a variety of woods and colours. The ‘Saxon’ and other Windsor chairs were purchased from High Wycombe by Wylie & Lochhead at this time. An example of a chair inlaid with woods and mother of pearl featured in their catalogue of early 20th century is illustrated in Agius (1978), p.122.

By 1908 Ednie and Taylor had left Wylie & Lochhead and by 1916 further additions to the Glasgow properties had been made. At Cleveland Street they had five floors of almost 21,000 square feet, the Kent Road workshop comprised almost 40,000 square feet and they had workshops or outlets at Belgrave (now Beltane) Street, Graeme (now Bell Street) and College and High Street.  Stores opened in Manchester and in Bloomsbury London, the latter still trading as late as 1930, while land had been acquired in the Natal.   

They held royal warrants as cabinet makers and upholsterers to Queen Victoria, the Prince of Wales, King Edward VII, King George V and King George VI. For the International Exhibitions in 1888, 1901, 1911 and 1938 the Royal Suites were furnished by Wylie and Lochhead. At the 1888 exhibition the suite comprised two retiring rooms and a dining room; the latter featured dark coloured ‘Scottish Baronial’ oak furniture (illus. Kinchin and Kinchin (1988), p. 23) and now at the Kelvingrove Art Gallery, Glasgow. They were also involved in the interiors of the Royal Yacht Britannia, the Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth liners. Also supplied cabinet work at Australia House, London; The British Museum; Lloyd’s Shipping Boardroom; Skibo Castle and Lloyd’s Bank in the early 20th century.

They continued to exhibit and Robert Wylie, as a member of the board of the Scottish Furniture Manufacturers’ Association, in January 1929 responded positively the idea of the Glasgow School of Art receiving a prize for Furniture Design. In 1947 they held The Swedish Home Exhibition at their Buchanan Street, which was sponsored by the Council of Industrial Design and in 1951 under Scottish Furniture Manufacturers Ltd’s banner their furniture was chosen by the Council of Industrial Design Selection Committee and displayed at South Bank’s Festival of Britain. Their 1951 sales catalogue illustrated the Cintique Chair, covered in ambia leather, designed by Ernest Race. In May 1956 a new Edinburgh store was opened but by this time Robert Wylie was in negotiations to sell.  Discussions were held first with Waring and Gillow and then with Great Universal Stores but finally in September 1957 a formal announcement was made confirming the sale of Wylie and Lochhead to the House of Fraser.  

Sources: Agius, British Furniture 1880-1915 (1978; Kinchin, ‘The Wylie & Lochhead Style’, The Decorative Arts Society 1850-1932 (1985); Kinchin and Kinchin, Glasgow Great Exhibitions 1888, 1901, 1911, 1838, 1988 (1988); Komanecky, ‘The Restoration of George Logan’s Rose Screen’, The Decorative Arts Society 1850 to the Present (1985); Cooper, ‘Post-War Scottish Furniture Design.  Scottish Furniture Manufacturers Ltd’, The Decorative Arts Society 1850 to the Present (2009);  Hooper, ‘Stockholm to Buchanan Street – Wylie and Lochhead and the New Style’, The Journal of the Decorative Arts Society 1850 to the Present (2013); Wallis, ‘A Hand-List of the Handley-Read Collection’, The Decorative Arts Society 1850 to the Present (2016).

Any questions please feel free to ask before you bid   

 

ABOUT US

Royal House Antiques is a privately owned family ran business founded in Wimbledon SW19 and now based in Pulborough RH20. We specialise in finding, restoring very fine luxury antique leather seating, along with every single other type of antique ranging from the 16th century to the 20th century. We also stock a number of designer brands such as Fritz Hansen, Ralph Lauren, Cavalli, Charles & Ray Eames, Vitra, David Linley, Rolex, Tiffany, Jager Le Coulter and so on     

 

PAYMENTS

We accept payment via Bitcoin, Bitcoin cash, Ethereum, Bacs, Chaps, PayPal or Card, we would kindly ask that all items are paid for within 48 hours and collected within 7 working days, we can hold all paid items for 14 days free of charge, there after a £20 a week storage fee will apply. We have long term storage which is very economically priced, we are happy to hold stock for as long as needed providing it is arranged prior to the purchase 

If sold items aren’t collected within three months and no arrangements have been made for long term storage you will forfeit the item and payment

 

CONDITION

Please view the very detailed pictures as they form part of the description pertaining to the condition. Please also ask any questions before you bid and not after, all of our items are sold as seen and as listed

Royal House Antiques cannot be held liable for any independent assumptions made regarding the items we sell, if you are unsure on any point, please feel free to ask for clarity  

Please note vintage period and original items such as leather seating will always have natural patina in the form of creasing and wear, we recommend annual waxing to ensure no moisture is lost, also hand dyed leather is not recommended to sit in direct sunlight for prolonged periods of time as it will dry out and fade   

 

DELIVERY OR COLLECTION

This item is available for collection from our Pulborough warehouses RH20-1DF by appointment only, alternatively we can have it delivered nationwide to include Scotland, Wales and Ireland for a fee

Please contact me via email, alternatively my contact information is under the business seller section of the listing, with your postcode for a delivery quotation, as mentioned above the fee listed covers with the M25 for the UK, for international deliveries the amount listed covers local Europe only so parts of Belgium and France

Please be sure to include which item you would like to buy as the price is determined on size and distance, if you would like more than one piece of furniture the courier offers a substantial discount on the second and third item, for international shipping please view the below information   

  

COURIER, LARGE ITEMS ONLY THAT CAN’T BE POSTED

We can arrange delivery nationwide, mostly with our nominated couriers, for Europe we use one reasonably priced professional company that we trust, for the rest of the world we use international shippers that can send any size item crated via air freight within 7-14 days after crating or soft packed and container shipped via sea freight within 30-60 days. The time frames outlined are guides only, non-domestic shipping is almost entirely governed by the airlines, sea freight loading times and custom clearances

Whomever delivers will always require help on the larger items to unload, the price you will be quoted will always be based on this assumption, if this is not possible, please let us know as it will affect the price to send a two-person team

Delivery is to the ground floor only, again if you need help upstairs or in flats etc that’s absolutely not a problem, the couriers charge £10-£20 per flight per man per item, if you have a working elevator then naturally there’s no additional fee

All courier fees are paid by yourself directly to the courier company, the contract for delivery is between yourselves the client and whichever courier you chose from those available I’m happy to accommodate your own courier after a cleared payment has been received, they need to book in a collection time with at least 24 hours notice, all collections must be made within 14 working days of the close of the sale unless agreed by prior arrangement  

 

IMPORT DUTY

Most countries charge some kind of import duty however almost all of our items won’t incur any charges as the items are exempt from tax due to the age and materials used

For European deliveries the price you will be quoted will include all clearance documentation and any customs charges so there won’t be any additional fees

For international deliveries such as the United States there can be some import duty to pay and or a clearance fee, I would estimate that 99% of all deliveries clear customs without being stopped for either

All duties are the responsibility of the purchaser who is the importer, they can’t be covered by the seller or shipping agent or factored in with additional retrospective discounts

 

RETURNS

Royal House Antiques offers a no quibble return policy if the item is not as described, if there are any issues with the piece you will be refunded in full once the item has been returned and inspected within 14 days, alternatively if there is a small issue, we can discuss finding a mutual resolution that makes all parties happy

We don’t offer a sale on approval service which means you can purchase the item, have it delivered and if you simply don’t like it, return it, this comes under change of mind or doesn’t fit. There is a lot of time, money and work involved in transporting goods around the world, the costs incurred can be vast so my advice would be if you are unsure on a piece please ask as many questions as you like to make sure you understand everything before you buy, if you are still unsure then please either arrange a viewing in person or if that’s not possible then don’t buy from an online retailer, perhaps look for a local gallery instead