Duncan phyfe biography

American cabinetmaker

Duncan Phyfe ( – 16 August )^[1] was twofold of nineteenth-century America's leading cabinetmakers.

Rather than create a recent furniture style, he interpreted chic European trends in a handling so distinguished and particular think about it he became a major propagandist for Neoclassicism in the Pooled States, influencing a generation emulate American cabinetmakers.

Life and career

Born Duncan Fife near Loch Fannich, Scotland, he immigrated with rule family to Albany, New Dynasty, in and served as unadorned cabinetmaker’s apprentice.^[2]

In he moved discover New York City^[2] and way of being year later is documented significance earliest mention of him reduce the price of the city, when he was elected to the General Nation of Mechanics and Tradesmen, godparented by Isaac Nichols and Seabury Champlin, either of whom haw have trained him.

By decency time of his marriage cloudless , he appears in representation New York directories as grand "joiner," but by he known as himself "cabinetmaker" and had altered the spelling of his honour to Phyfe. He opened government own business in and was listed as a cabinetmaker require the New-York Directory and Register. From his first shop be thankful for 2 Broad Street, he ulterior moved to Partition Street (later renamed Fulton Street in barge in honor of Robert Fulton), whirl location he stayed for the settle of his life.

A poverty-stricken immigrant when he arrived farm animals America from his native Scotland, Phyfe acquired wealth and celebrity through hard work, exceptional flair and the support of business. He would come to suit among his clients some appreciated the nation's wealthiest and escalate storied families.

Throughout the premier half of the nineteenth c he made Neoclassical furniture possession the social and mercantile undivided of New York, Philadelphia, Colony, and the American South pivot he was particularly popular. Crush during his lifetime as goodness "United States Rage", to that day remains America's best-known cabinetmaker,^[3] establishing his reputation as natty purveyor of luxury by conniving high-quality furniture.

His personal entertain, characterized by superior proportions, saddened, symmetry, and restraint, became justness New York local style. Hang around apprentices and journeymen exposed pause this distinctive style by ration a stint in the Phyfe shop or by copying illustriousness master cabinetmaker's designs helped stopper create and sustain this provincial school of cabinetmaking.

Demand gather Phyfe's work reached its heart between and , although let go remained a dominant figure sieve the trade until , what because he retired at the deceive of seventy-seven.

In the interior the short span of out single generation, however, the out of a job of the master was disturbance but forgotten until the resurfacing in the s, when iciness furniture companies replicated his designs for several decades.^{[citation needed]}

He became known as one of America's leading cabinetmakers by selling chattels at relatively low prices.

Phyfe’s work encompassed a broad sort of the period’s Neoclassical styles, starting from his earliest furniture— which bear the influence carefulness his 18th-century British predecessors Clockmaker Sheraton and Thomas Hope— eternal with Regency, Federal, Empire cranium ending with his late unfruitful designs in the Grecian sincere style.^{[citation needed]}

Between and , Dancer Phyfe took his two fry, Michael and James, as job partners and the firm went under the names D.

Phyfe & Sons (–) and name Michael's premature death, D. Phyfe & Son (–). It was during the latter and last stages of the business’s story that perhaps the greatest complain Phyfe ever faced emerged; endeavor to cope with the newborn wave of historical revival styles. In , one Southern frontiersman who came to New Royalty from Columbia, South Carolina, empirical to his wife in out letter that the Phyfes were "as much behind the epoch in style as (they were) in price." Because the Phyfes always adhered to the formalist language,^[4] they never fully busy with the emerging historical resurrection styles (e.g.

Gothic, Rococo, Reanimation etc.) that began about that time.

Duncan Phyfe and tiara son James closed the coat business in after fifty-five period in the trade. They spoken for an auction of the blow contents of their furniture depot. The auctioneer was Halliday & Jenkins.^[5]

Because Phyfe's furniture was not often signed,^[3] yet widely imitated, absent yourself is sometimes difficult to stimulating with accuracy which works subside actually made.

He is laid to rest dead and b at Green-Wood Cemetery in Borough, New York.^[6]

Major exhibitions and collections

On 15 October , the Town Museum of Art opened object to the public "Furniture from honourableness Workshop of Duncan Phyfe", honourableness first exhibition ever held solution an art museum on nobility work of a single cabinetmaker.^[7] Ninety years later and single for the second time comport yourself history, a major retrospective award this iconic American craftsman don his furniture was again covering view from 20 December – 6 May , under description title "Duncan Phyfe: Master Woodsman in New York".

Another county show took place at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston give birth to 24 June – 9 Sept

Duncan Phyfe's furniture can properly admired in the White Igloo Green Room, Edgewater, Roper See to and especially at Millford Farm, owned by the Classical English Homes Preservation Trust. His paraphernalia appears in many museums tube private collections as well.

In popular culture

Phyfe’s artistry has prolonged to resonate with collectors put up with creative communities throughout the Twentieth and 21st centuries. This bottle be seen through popular chic references to his craftsmanship, distinction high esteem in which noisy is held, and the national cachet it confers.

Examples execute such references include the following:

Karl Shapiro refers to leadership fly's leg as "the marvellous leg of a Duncan-Phyfe," unfailingly his poem "The Fly".

Likewise, in one of the passages of the novel Tender remains the Night by F. Histrion Fitzgerald, he wrote: "She without a solution all over a set renounce cost a fortune, in uncluttered Duncan Phyfe dining-room".^[8]

Similarly, in jewels novel Jazz, Toni Morrison refers to Phyfe: “after they’d frayed they rolled cigarettes and fixed down on the curb chimp though it were a Dancer Phyfe.”^[9]

In the Summer episode liberation Gilmore Girls: A Year consign the Life, Rory notes lapse Emily's living room table evolution a Duncan Phyfe.

In grandeur episode A Plaque for Mayberry on the Andy Griffith Feint, the character Barney Fife thinks he is related to Dancer Phyfe.

Fran Lebowitz references tiara artistry as a fine colleague for anyone in her categorization “Pointers for Pets” from draw collection Social Studies (): “Georgian silver and Duncan Phyfe sofas make wonderful companions, as physical exertion all alcoholic beverages and out-of-season fruits.”^[10]

One of the world's most outstanding roadside attractions is a ogre chair located in Thomasville, Northernmost Carolina.

The monument was erected in , and the plaquette located on its pedestal reads: "This chair is an copy and inspiration for future generations to emulate and perpetuate honesty achievements of our time-honored effects designers and craftsmen. The recent chair was the creation a choice of the famous American designer Dancer Phyfe".

Some years later, selection replica of a Phyfe mockup chair was built in imprint Washington, DC.

See also

References

External links