What is 'Arts and Crafts' Furniture?

Born out of the uniquely American Arts and Crafts movement, Craftsman, or Mission, furniture has a distinctive organic appeal. Individual craftspeople stressed utilitarian design, elegant structure, and handmade joinery to complement the architecture and interior design of Craftsman houses of the early 1900s. Inspired by the French Art Nouveau and critiquing the British Victorian culture, the Arts and Crafts movement began around 1880 and rose to a popular height in America from 1900-1919. Founding members, such as Gustav Stickley, William Morris, and the Greene and Greene brothers, rejected the ornamentation and grandeur of Victorian décor. They contended that the other contemporary styles disguised structure and accepted cheap reproductions rather than authentic constructions. As the United States moved towards mass-production of household goods, these designers wanted to return to a pre-Industrial individualism which valued talented woodworkers and familiar materials. Craftsman fur ... more

Born out of the uniquely American Arts and Crafts movement, Craftsman, or Mission, furniture has a distinctive organic appeal. Individual craftspeople stressed utilitarian design, elegant structure, and handmade joinery to complement the architecture and interior design of Craftsman houses of the early 1900s. Inspired by the French Art Nouveau and critiquing the British Victorian culture, the Arts and Crafts movement began around 1880 and rose to a popular height in America from 1900-1919. Founding members, such as Gustav Stickley, William Morris, and the Greene and Greene brothers, rejected the ornamentation and grandeur of Victorian décor. They contended that the other contemporary styles disguised structure and accepted cheap reproductions rather than authentic constructions. As the United States moved towards mass-production of household goods, these designers wanted to return to a pre-Industrial individualism which valued talented woodworkers and familiar materials. Craftsman furn ... more