Chair
1896 (designed), ca. 1908 (made)
| Artist/Maker | |
| Place of origin |
The Scottish architect George Walton first designed this chair around 1896, the year when he began designing the interiors of fashionable tea rooms for John Rowntree in Scarborough and Miss Kate Cranston in Glasgow, which included chairs like these. From 1898 Walton was designing showrooms for the Eastman Photographic Materials Company, soon to be renamed Kodak, in London, Brussels and elsewhere. He used this chair design so frequently that it became almost a trade mark of the showrooms. George Davison joined the Eastman Company in 1897 and prospered as Kodak profited from the growing popularity of amateur photography. By 1908 Davison was able to commission George Walton to design him a house, the White House on the banks of the Thames at Shiplake, Oxfordshire, and the chair design re-appeared in the dining room. This is one of the chairs from that house.
Object details
| Categories | |
| Object type | |
| Materials and techniques | Ebonised birch, caning |
| Brief description | Ebonised birch chair with caned seat and back, designed by George Walton, about 1896, made for The White House, Shiplake, ca. 1908 |
| Physical description | Chair, one of a pair, made of ebonised birch with slender, tapering legs and caned seat, and a narrow, caned panel in the centre of the back with turned bobbin decoration |
| Dimensions |
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| Gallery label |
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| Object history | The design is dated to 1896 because this was the earliest date Walton was designing tea rooms for John Rowntree in Scarborough and Catherine Cranston in Glasgow, commissions where he first used this design (see Karen Moon, George Walton, 1993, p54). The chair design was later used for many Kodak showroom interiors and for the dining room at the White House, Shiplake, which was built in 1908 and for where this example was supplied. Object sampling carried out by Jo Darrah, V&A Science; drawer/slide reference 6/8. |
| Production | The registered description dates the chair to 1903. See object history note for why this date is not used here. |
| Summary | The Scottish architect George Walton first designed this chair around 1896, the year when he began designing the interiors of fashionable tea rooms for John Rowntree in Scarborough and Miss Kate Cranston in Glasgow, which included chairs like these. From 1898 Walton was designing showrooms for the Eastman Photographic Materials Company, soon to be renamed Kodak, in London, Brussels and elsewhere. He used this chair design so frequently that it became almost a trade mark of the showrooms. George Davison joined the Eastman Company in 1897 and prospered as Kodak profited from the growing popularity of amateur photography. By 1908 Davison was able to commission George Walton to design him a house, the White House on the banks of the Thames at Shiplake, Oxfordshire, and the chair design re-appeared in the dining room. This is one of the chairs from that house. |
| Associated objects |
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| Bibliographic reference | Moon, Karen. George Walton, designer and architect. 1993 |
| Collection | |
| Accession number | CIRC.120-1959 |
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| Record created | February 28, 2007 |
| Record URL |
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