Georgian Chests
A Georgian chest is a lidded storage box of the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, made to hold linen, blankets, valuables or plate before drawers and wardrobes were common in the house.
Georgian Chests
Oak runs through the category, named in more than half of all titles. The two shapes that dominate are the coffer, a lift-lid chest of joined or plank construction, and the mule chest, which is a coffer with one to three working drawers in the base. Coffer appears in a third of titles, mule in over a quarter. So the piece you're most likely to meet is floor-standing, rectangular and opens at the top.
Below that sits a strand of pine and elm blanket or bedding boxes, plainer things, sometimes painted. Then leather, hide and metal-bound travelling trunks, brass-studded or box-shaped. Welsh work forms its own group, including the small coffrau bach, spelled coffer bach or coffor bach depending on the dealer. Lancashire is the only English county attached to these with any regularity.
A narrower run covers chests made for one job: silver chests, cellarettes for wine bottles, sea and campaign chests, dower chests. These tend to be mahogany or walnut rather than oak, and some stand on their own legs or a separate stand.
Dating is mostly by label rather than year. Georgian and 18th Century account for the bulk of it, with only 71 of 442 listings on Sellingantiques carrying a clean year. Where a year is given it clusters between about 1720 and 1800, and one coffer carries a date of 1754 carved into the object itself. Around 45 of these come to market in a year, listed by 148 different dealers, so it's a category almost every country-furniture dealer touches.
Where The Range Splits
Timber sets the floor and the ceiling. Painted pine and elm boxes hold the bottom of the range, and the mahogany, walnut and satinwood pieces sit at the top. The highest-priced things in the archive aren't blanket chests at all but silver chests, cellarettes and chests on stand, where the wood and the purpose pull in the same direction.
Construction separates the middle. A joined and panelled coffer, framed and pegged with panels set into the frame, ranks above one built from five or six wide nailed boards. Fielded or raised panels push higher again. Carving, inlay and an original painted surface all lift a piece, and the inlaid Welsh coffers and carved oak coffers appear well up the range.
Scale works at both ends. Large three-panel coffers and three-drawer mule chests do well, and so do the smallest things in the category: the little Welsh coffrau bach reach the very top despite being miniature. Plain, mid-sized and undecorated is where the range flattens out.
Georgian Chests Retail Price Guide 2026
Typical UK retail prices for georgian chests, 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.
Welsh work is the one strong regional strand on Sellingantiques, with the small coffer bach listed as coffor bach and coffr bach too.
The Georgian Chests Glossary
- Coffer
- A lift-lid chest, usually oak, of joined or plank construction. It's in a third of titles in this category and the word does most of the work in listings.
- Mule chest
- A coffer with one to three working drawers built into the base, giving you storage you can reach without lifting the lid. Named in over a quarter of titles.
- Joined
- Framed and pegged construction using mortice-and-tenon joints, as against boards simply nailed together. Named outright in a handful of titles, implied by 'panelled' in many more.
- Panelled
- The lid or front made of panels set into a surrounding frame. Listings sometimes go further and say 'fielded' or 'raised', meaning the panel face is shaped rather than flat.
- Coffer bach
- Welsh for 'little chest', also spelled coffor bach or coffr bach. A small oak chest, sometimes standing on turned feet.
- Cellarette
- A lidded, often lined case made to hold wine bottles, sometimes cut to a sarcophagus shape. Filed here because it's a chest, priced with the mahogany end of the category.
Georgian Chests: Frequently Asked Questions
What's the difference between a coffer and a mule chest?
A coffer is a plain lift-lid chest with a single open interior. A mule chest is the same thing with one to three drawers built into the base.
Both turn up throughout the category. Coffer appears in a third of titles on Sellingantiques, mule in a little over a quarter, and 'oak mule' is the single commonest phrase of all.
Which wood do Georgian chests usually come in?
Oak, by a wide margin. It's named in more than half of all titles, and the joined and panelled oak coffer is the shape the category is built around.
Pine and elm make up the next group, mostly blanket and bedding boxes. Mahogany and walnut appear on the purpose-made pieces. Anything else, camphorwood, cedar, teak, chestnut, is scarce across the whole archive.
Are Welsh chests a separate group?
Yes, and it's the one strongly regional strand in the category. Welsh appears in a couple of dozen titles, often as Welsh oak.
The coffrau bach, the little chests, are the notable part. They're the smallest things listed and they reach the very top of the range. Welsh work is also rising as a share of live stock.
Why are some pieces dated 19th century or Victorian?
The dated field spans 1700 to 1920, so a few pieces filed under this heading sit either side of the Georgian span. A handful of 17th Century and Victorian entries appear too.
The profile is still overwhelmingly Georgian and 18th Century. Only 71 of 442 listings carry a clean year at all; the rest sit under period labels.
What is a coffer bach?
A small Welsh oak chest, the name meaning 'little chest'. Dealers spell it coffer bach, coffor bach or coffr bach, and around two dozen titles use one form or another.
Some stand on turned feet. Despite the size, inlaid examples sit at the upper end of the category.
Do travelling trunks belong in this category?
They do. Trunk appears in roughly one in six titles, though a smaller share of those are true travelling trunks rather than box-shaped storage chests.
Leather, hide and metal-bound examples turn up, along with brass studding and camphorwood. Odd things surface once or twice: a whaling sea chest, a mail carriage strong box, a pony-skin trunk.