Antique Heals Dressing Tables between £0 and £0
A bedroom dressing table or dressing chest retailed by Heal's of London, usually in oak, made for keeping toilet articles to hand under a mirror.
What Are Heal's Dressing Tables?
Two forms sit under the heading. One is the table proper: a kneehole or pedestal frame with drawers either side and a mirror above. The other is the dressing chest, a chest of drawers carrying a mirror, which does the same job on a smaller footprint. Chest phrasing appears in twelve of thirty-seven titles.
Oak dominates. Twenty-five of thirty-seven titles say oak, and only three name another timber: mahogany, burr walnut and one limed oak. The dating clusters just as hard, with thirteen listings in the 1920s and twelve in the 1930s, so the piece you are most likely to meet is an oak dressing table or chest from between the wars.
A handful carry a Heal's range name in the title, Tilden twice, Newlyn twice, and St. Ives, Letchworth and Buttery Hutch once each. Four titles use Art Deco, each of them dated 1920 or 1930. Earlier pieces turn up in other timbers, including a Victorian burr walnut pedestal and mahogany examples, and dates given as Victorian, Edwardian or 19th Century are worth treating as approximate: some sit against titles naming twentieth-century ranges.
This is a category you meet by waiting. Twelve dealers have listed one on Sellingantiques, and only around three come to market in a year.
What Sets Them Apart
The retailer's label does the heaviest lifting. Eight titles advertise a surviving paper label or stamp, and those listings gather in the upper part of the range, including the two highest-priced oak chests. With a retailer's piece rather than a named maker's, the label is what ties the object to the name.
After that, a named range. Tilden, Newlyn, St. Ives, Letchworth and Buttery Hutch each appear in titles, and the Letchworth and Newlyn examples sit high. Roughly seven listings out of thirty-seven carry one, so a range name is the exception. Titles reading Early Heals or Very Rare Early behave the same way, five of them, four in the upper part.
Timber and finish move things too. Oak is the default, so the burr walnut pedestal, the mahogany pieces and the limed oak table all sit above the oak middle. Original painted decoration appears twice, both in the upper half. Three listings include a matching stool, one of them among the most expensive; the rest are the table or chest alone.
Retail Price Guide 2026
Typical UK retail prices for heals dressing tables between £0 and £0, calculated from the Sellingantiques database of over a million retail prices indexed since 2003. This retail price guide relies exclusively on Sellingantiques data; no external sources or auction records are used, so the figures do not describe the wider market.
Heals dressing tables have appeared on Sellingantiques since 2012.
Heal's of London
The Antique Heals Dressing Tables between £0 and £0 Glossary
- Dressing chest
- A chest of drawers with a mirror mounted above it, doing the dressing table's work in a smaller footprint. The word chest appears in about a third of titles here.
- Labelled
- The retailer's paper label or stamp survives on the piece. Eight of these titles say so, and the spelling Labeled turns up as well.
- Pedestal
- A dressing table built with a stack of drawers either side of a central kneehole.
- Limed oak
- Oak with a white filler worked into the grain, leaving a pale, chalky surface. One example.
- Tilden
- A Heal's range name, on two oak pieces here, once written as Tilden Range. Newlyn, St. Ives and Letchworth appear the same way, each in a single title.
- Squashed heart
- A pierced heart motif, named in one title on an oak chest of drawers, which sits at the very top of the range.
Frequently Asked Questions
What wood are they usually made from?
Oak, overwhelmingly. Twenty-five of thirty-seven titles name it, and it is the default across both the table form and the dressing chest.
Only three titles name anything else: mahogany, burr walnut and a single limed oak table. Those non-oak pieces sit above the oak middle of the range.
When were most of them made?
The dated listings run from 1890 to 1930, and twenty-six carry a clean year. Thirteen fall in the 1920s and twelve in the 1930s.
That leaves barely a tenth outside those two decades. Entries labelled Victorian, Edwardian or 19th Century are loose rather than firm, and two of them carry range names tied to the twentieth-century oak pieces.
Does a Heal's label matter?
It shows up in the pricing. Eight titles advertise a surviving label or stamp, and those listings gather toward the top, including the two highest-priced oak chests.
The rest are sold on form and range name alone.
What are Tilden, Newlyn and Letchworth?
Range names used by Heal's, carried in the titles. Tilden appears twice, Newlyn twice, and St. Ives, Letchworth and Buttery Hutch once each.
That is about seven listings out of thirty-seven, so a named range is uncommon. The Letchworth and Newlyn examples sit high in the range.
How often do they come up for sale?
Rarely. Twelve dealers have listed one on Sellingantiques, and only around three come to market in a year.
It is a category a buyer meets by waiting rather than by browsing.
Do any come with a matching stool?
Three listings include one. The rest are the dressing table or the dressing chest on its own.
Completeness tells: one of the three sits among the most expensive in the category.