AFA Summer 2018

Antiques & Fine Art 121 2018 large number of brass nails ornamenting it that were utilitarian as well as decorative. A green corrosion product was discovered in these brass nail holes indicating that they were used with leather. The corrosion product is due to the chemical reaction of the brass and the acids in the tanned leather hides. Leather upholstery was often nailed to the frame in places where textiles might have been seamed. Brass nails were often used to secure the leather in these locations and hide the joints. The location and number of brass nail holes on this chair combined with the green corrosion product indicate that the chair was originally upholstered in leather. It would have looked identical to this reproduction easy chair that was upholstered in leather using the traditional methods indicated on the antique frame (Fig. 11). Once the evidence is read, a conservator can reconstruct the original appearance of an upholstered seat using nonintrusive methods and conservation safe materials. A circa-1760 London sofa upholstered in reproduction blue silk damask illustrates how the nonintrusive treatment pioneered by conservator Leroy Graves at Colonial Williamsburg recreates the original intent of the maker without further damaging the frame as would traditional nailed-on upholstery (Fig. 12). Upholstery CSI: Reading the Evidence at the DeWitt Wallace Decorative Arts Museum at Colonial Williamsburg, Virginia, opens on May 26, 2018, and runs through December 2020. The upholstery evidence included in this article is based on research by Leroy Graves and published in his book, Early Seating Upholstery: Reading the Evidence (2015). Tara Gleason Chicirda is curator of furniture at the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation. Leroy Graves is senior conservator of upholstery at the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation. 1. Ronald L. Hurst, “Furniture: From “Neat and Plain” to Neoclassical” in George Washington’s Mount Vernon , Wendell Garrett, ed. (New York: The Monacelli Press, 1998), 156–157. Fig. 12: “Deconstructed” sofa illustrated in figure 1. Although this sofa looks like it was upholstered using traditional methods, senior conservator of upholstery, Leroy Graves, created a nonintrusive upholstery system to replicate the original appearance. The system gives the look of the traditional upholstery without adding new nail holes and thus damage to the frame. The system is fabricated with conservation safe materials such as Ethafoam, copper, epoxy-infused linen, and plastic covered in a reproduction silk damask.