This questions concerns an antique chair bought in Bucks…

Hi Eloise,

This is a very pretty chair and looks to be in unusually original condition. It's hard to tell whether the ghost of the painted decoration on the crest rail is an outline that was never completed, or an original design that was subsequently overpainted -though not long after. Most likely the latter.

It's rare to find these with the original rush in the seats. You can tell it's rush, not twisted paper pulp (the usual material these days) because of all the knots and loose ends underneath. The bulrush or river rush (Scirpus lacustris) used for weaving may be long, but it's not endless, and the beginnings and ends of individual rushes are always numerous and visible underneath. With pulpwood paper 'rush' spooled onto a weaving shuttle, the seat can be finished in just a couple of tie-ins and the underside looks quite different and almost absent of loose ends.

One of the more reliable ways of dating these chairs is by the pattern of turning in the legs and stretchers. This design, lathe-turned to look like bamboo, complete with realistic faux nodes, was very fashionable in the first half of the 1800s, which is when I would say your chair dates to, probably around 1840 going by the more elaborate turning on those three vertical spindles.

• Early 19th C painted spindle-back country side chair, curved plank-form crest rail, over three ball-and-reel turned spindles attached to the upper of two curved horizontal plain spindles flanked by round stiles decorated with a band of reel turning, joined to a square seat rail and rush seat, faux bamboo turned lower frame, the whole pinstripe decorated in green & black over (once) yellow and painted scrolling foliate motif centering the crest rail.

The fact that it was bought in the uber-artisan haven of Bucks Co., PA in the 1950s-1960s is excellent provenance that will give it a handsome nudge in value. This style of fancy painted chair was found all over New England at the time, so hard to be more specific as to where exactly it was made, all stimulated by Pennsylvania Dutch painted chairs and Connecticut's famous Hitchcock fancy painted chairs of the 1830s onward.

As for value, this would auction in the range of $180 - $250.

I would therefore insure it for at least $500.

Hope this is helpful.

Best wishes,
Robert.