What period do most cushion mirrors date from?

The dated field runs from 1700 to 1930, and the 19th century carries the weight of it. Where dealers commit to a decade, the 1860s and 1870s together outnumber every other decade. A large group is dated only to "19th Century" and nothing narrower, so a hundred-year span is all some listings offer. Earlier timber frames described as c.1690 to c.1700 are present but thin on the ground.

Are cushion mirrors French or English?

Both, and more besides. French appears in around two fifths of titles, almost all of them 19th-century carved wood and gesso frames, gilt or painted. Titles also name Dutch, Flemish, Italian, Venetian, Florentine, English and Continental origins. Flemish and Florentine are the rarest, and the single Florentine reference is given only as a probability.

Which woods were used for the frames?

Walnut leads the timber frames, often as burr or with marquetry inlay. Oyster-cut laburnum, yew and olive wood turn up on the earliest pieces. Beyond that the archive names birdseye maple, burr maple, rosewood, ebony, mahogany, oak and scrubbed oak, several of them only once or twice.

How big do cushion mirrors get?

Sizes run from small hanging mirrors up to overmantels and one described as a floor mirror. Where dimensions reach the title, they range from 39cm at the small end to 169cm at the large. Large qualifies about a third of the titles listed on Sellingantiques, so scale is a defining feature of the category rather than an exception.

What are metal cushion mirror frames made from?

Brass is the common one, worked as repoussé, where sheet metal is hammered into relief from behind, or pressed into shape. The archive also holds toleware, copper, silvered repoussé and a brass-and-tortoiseshell combination. They form a consistent but small strand against the timber and gesso majority.

Do many dealers handle this category?

Eighty-eight different dealers have listed cushion mirrors on Sellingantiques, and roughly twenty-eight come to market in a year. That spread means the category isn't held by a few specialists. It also means descriptions vary in style, and dating between a title and the dated field is sometimes inconsistent.

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Antique Cushion Mirrors

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A cushion mirror is a wall looking-glass whose frame swells outward in a deep, pillow-like convex moulding around the plate, made to hang in a domestic room.