During the second half of the nineteenth century the design of American furniture enjoyed a phase of extraordinary creativity. While the preceding years had witnessed a succession of historicizing European styles, interiors of the Gilded Age were highly eclectic, freely mixing stylistic elements from a much larger repertoire of cultural sources. During this time of seemingly limitless exploration and experimentation, the American aesthetic sensibility was intrinsically transformed.

Major figures in this movement were Gustave Herter, a wood carver and cabinetmaker who emigrated from Stuttgart, Germany to the United States in 1848, and his younger brother Christian, who joined him in New York City in 1859. By the 1880s, their influential firm was known for well-executed furniture and elaborate interiors. Herter Brothers also designed entire residences, specifying every single interior and exterior decorative detail, and its success can be measured by the prominence of patrons such as President Ulysses S. Grant, William H. Vanderbilt and J. Pierpont Morgan.

A Herter Brothers side chair that entered the collection of the Department of American Decorative Arts in 1995 represents one of several related models that were executed for different clients (Figure 1). These designs share the basic form of their frames, while each incorporates a unique combination of decorative motifs and surface treatment. The Metropolitan Museum's chair, with the manufacturer's number 426 stamped onto the bottom of the rear seat rail, combines hoof feet, flared stiles, a crescent backrest, and carved, Japanese-inspired floral motifs in the lower back rail, all executed with an elegance drawn from French furniture of the late eighteenth century. The original owner is not certain, although the Museum's side chair is identical to those made for the drawing room of Pierpont Morgan's Madison Avenue residence, built between 1880 and 1882 (Figure 2). Herter Brothers produced a similar interior furnished with the same side chairs for the home of Oliver Ames in Boston (1883). In these rooms the stylized sunflower motif was incorporated into the design of the wall frieze, the wallpaper, and the delicate fabrics used for curtains and upholstery.

The finish seen on the Museum's chair, with gold flakes against an ivory-colored background, recalls decorative surfaces found on Japanese ceramic and lacquered objects. Two display cabinets from the Morgan and Ames drawing rooms with the same finish also reflect the influence of Japanese design. Illustrative of the eclectic taste of the time, these cabinets combine late-eighteenth-century English tapered square legs and Rococo-inspired floral swags with a Japanesque shelving arrangement.

Another side chair from this group of related designs, stamped 170 by Herter Brothers, was produced between 1879 and 1882 for the drawing room of William H. Vanderbilt's New York mansion (Figure 3). Decorated with carved beads, ribbons, and a pair of undulating snakes on the lower backrest, the surface of the chair is gilded and inlaid with mother-of-pearl. Two less elaborate side chairs were made for the homes of Mrs. R. L. Stuart and Jacob Ruppert. Both have turned front legs with conical feet, and while the crest rail on the Stuart chair is inlaid with a floral pattern in black and white marquetry, the other is entirely gilded and displays a carved floral bas-relief (Figure 4).

The condition of the Metropolitan Museum's "gold-flake" side chair is quite delicate, in part because poor adhesion of the white ground to the maple substrate—presumably induced by exposure to high relative humidity—led to a very unstable finish. Some fifty percent of the surface has been lost through the gradual delamination of small fragments (Figure 5). Likewise, the chair's surviving upholstery is extremely fragile. Still, it is exceedingly rare to find a late-nineteenth-century chair retaining much unmodified original finish and upholstery, even if both are in poor condition.

To prepare this chair for display in one of the Museum's galleries would require an inappropriately invasive restoration campaign of prohibitive length. Therefore, in consultation with the Department of American Decorative Arts, it was decided not to "complete" the chair, but to preserve what is extant. A thorough investigation of the finish was carried out in order to characterize materials and application techniques, and to help choose a safe treatment that would prevent further loss.

Microscopic examination of cross-sections of the finish under visible and ultraviolet light revealed that the wood substrate was first covered with several thin, white paint layers. The small flakes of gold leaf on top of this base are covered with a layer of clear varnish (Figure 6). An attempt to characterize the varnish using Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy proved unsuccessful, but when observed under ultraviolet light it displayed a distinct blue fluorescence, suggesting the presence of a natural plant resin. Gilded surfaces on other Herter Brothers furniture emit a similar UV-fluorescence when viewed in cross-section, and in these instances analysis of the varnish layers resulted in the identification of copal as the main component. In the nineteenth century this natural resin was a common addition to furniture finishes, serving to increase their durability as well as introducing a warm tone. Linseed oil, identified as an ingredient in the finish of the Metropolitan Museum's chair on the basis of the fatty acids present, was similarly common in nineteenth-century varnish recipes, as it increases elasticity. Elemental analysis of the paint layers with energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy demonstrated the presence of lead white and barium sulfate, which appear frequently as ingredients in nineteenth-century recipes for white oil paints. The gold flakes in the finish also were analyzed, and the alloy found to contain approximately thirty percent silver.

Instrumental analysis combined with solvent testing helped to establish that stabilization of the surface could be carried out safely with a solution of five percent Acryloid^® B67 in equal parts xylene and Stoddard solvent. Following introduction of the consolidant, each unstable paint fragment was eased down individually, and slight pressure was applied to treated areas using small weights isolated from the surface with Mylar^® film. It was necessary to relax severely cupped fragments before they could be consolidated, which was achieved by wetting them with the same solvent mixture.

The visual imbalance between the original finish, which over the years has acquired an almost green hue, and the aged maple, was reason to inpaint the wood in places where it was exposed. A solution of rabbit skin glue in distilled water was applied to seal the maple, after which a visually more uniform surface was created using pigments mixed in an acrylic medium. Only where the substrate had turned very dark was it necessary to increase the opacity of the acrylic paint by adding fumed silica.

After encapsulation of the upholstery with a cover of Stabiltex™, a plain-woven multifilament polyester fabric, the chair was installed for long-term display in the Henry R. Luce Center for the Study of American Art, where it can be viewed by the public. Equally important, and befitting the American Wing's tradition of strong interest in the material aspects of its collection, this chair provides a valuable opportunity for furniture scholars to further research the materials and techniques originally applied in the highly evolved furniture trade in New York at the end of the nineteenth century.

Since 1994, Pascale Patris, Assistant Conservator, has worked at the Fairchild Center, where her main responsibility is the research and treatment of gilded surfaces on furniture and wooden objects, primarily from the Departments of European Sculpture and Decorative Arts and American Decorative Arts. Her training and private practice in Paris, from 1980 to 1988, focused on the conservation of European decorative arts and sculpture. She has participated in diverse conservation projects in France, including the restoration of early Baroque frescoes in Brittany and preliminary studies for the restoration of a Baroque monumental altar in Grenoble and Renaissance busts in the Louvre.

Nancy Britton, Associate Conservator, treated the upholstery of the side chair. Gas-chromatography analysis of the varnish was carried out by Richard Laursen, Professor of Chemistry, Boston University.