Mission Style Furniture - Get this Classic Look in Your Home
If you like your furnishings built solid and built to last with no frills or unneeded embellishment, then Mission Style furnishings is what you're looking for. The Mission or Arts and Crafts Movement was a backlash against the extravagant, over-the-top designs of the Victorian era and also against the accumulation produced furnishings emerging after the industrial revolution. In the late 1890s, craftsmen such as Gustav Stickley led the charge to combine clean, nonrepresentational lines and natural materials to produce structurally good pieces that emphasized the originality of the craftsman and his handiwork.
Telltale signs of Mission Style furnishings include visible joints, such as the cut and tenon that was popular at the time and continues to help furnishings makers today, as well as quarter-sawn wood which gave the grain a beautiful look. Nails and rivets were often left exposed to add a gleaming contrast to the wood or upholstery. While the philosophy seems to set-up decades of fabulously boring furniture, it was anything but. Rather, Mission furnishings was beautifully designed, with manufacturers relying on exquisite craftsmanship and finishing techniques to add peaceful elegance to an item.
The Mission Style has been revived recently with many furnishings manufacturers producing sturdier, solid wood pieces built to be passed on from generation to generation. This philosophy has been extended to such of the aesthetic of contemporary furniture. Clean, sharp nonrepresentational lines and a lack of ornamentation along with a renewed sense of pride in craftsmanship are present in such of today's furniture.
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