Victorian Walnut Gallery Whatnot

• Victorian Period - The Victorian period of furniture and decorative arts design covers the reign of Queen Victoria from 1837 to 1901. There was not one dominant style of furniture in the Victorian period. Designers used and modified many historical styles such as Gothic, Tudor, Elizabethan, English Rococo, Neoclassical and others, although use of some styles, such as English Rococo and Gothic tended to dominate the furniture manufacture of the period.
  
  The Victorian period was preceded by the Regency and William IV periods, and followed by the Edwardian period, named for Edward VII (1841 ? 1910) who was King of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions and Emperor of India for the brief period from 1901 until his death in 1910.
• Satinwood - Satinwood is a dense pale gold coloured timber that was imported into Britain in the second half of the 18th century, and early 19th centuries from the East Indies and the West Indies. The name derives from the satin-like surface sheen when the timber is polished.
  
  It was used in the solid, as a veneer and in inlays. As well as furniture, satinwood was used for making musical instruments, barometers, boxes and clocks.
  
  It will usually be found on only the very best quality objects, presumably because of of its cost at the time.
• Gallery - On furniture, a gallery is a small upright section, frequently pierced and decorated, around the tops of small items of furniture, such as davenports, side tables, and so forth. Galleries are made in brass or bronze,and be fretted, pierced or solid timber. A three-quarter gallery is one that surrounds three of the four sides of a table, desk or other top.
• Turning - Any part of a piece of furniture that has been turned and shaped with chisels on a lathe. Turned sections include legs, columns, feet, finials, pedestals, stretchers, spindles etc. There have been many varieties and fashions over the centuries: baluster, melon, barley-sugar, bobbin, cotton-reel, rope-twist, and so on. Split turning implies a turned section that has been cut in half lengthwise and applied to a cabinet front as a false decorative support.
• Fluting - A form of decoration found on many pieces of furniture, as well as ceramics, silver and clocks, in which round-bottomed grooves, of varying width and depth, are let into columns, pilasters, legs. As a general rule, flutes are cut in the vertical, though they may follow a turned leg in a spiral pattern. In cross-section, they may be described as a series of 'U' shapes, rising and narrowing at each end of the groove. Fluting is the opposite of reeding, with which fluting is often associated.
• Blind Tooling / Blind Tooled - Blind tooling is a technique used in the decoration of leather goods such as book covers, belts, and wallets. It involves the use of specialized tools to impress designs and patterns onto the surface of the leather without the use of added colour.
  
  The process involves the use of a variety of tools, including stamps, embossing tools, and finishing tools, which are used to create various textures and patterns on the leather surface. The tools are heated, and then pressed onto the leather, leaving an impression. The tools can be used to create designs that are simple or complex, with a variety of textures and patterns, including geometric shapes, florals, or scenes. The leather is then burnished to enhance the design and give it a smooth finish.
• Tooled - Decoration of a leather surface, usually by stamping the surface with a heated punch or wheel containing foliate or geometric designs. In blind tooling the surface of the punch or wheel is in direct contact with the leather, while in gold tooling, a ribbon of gold leaf is placed between the punch or wheel and the leather, and once they have been applied, the excess gold is brushed off, leaving only the design.

This item has been included into following indexes:

• furniture, items - whatnots, British and French 165