What is a farmhouse table?

[Jamie Buxton]

Prashun's current thread about building a farmhouse table has me wondering. What is a farmhouse table? I'd have said: big, plank top, aprons, chunky legs at the corners, kinda rustic, most likely softwood. What do you all say is a farmhouse table?

[Mel Fulks]

The most common type sold as antiques around here have ship lapped tops held down with cut nails. Big clunky tapered legs often chewed at bottom. Mostly bare wood with traces of paint.

[Frederick Skelly]

Long, thick top, trestle style legs pushed out a couple feet from each end, uses benches for seating.

[Dave Richards]

I think of a heavy table with heavy farm-wife legs at he corners, large enough to seat all the hands for mid-day dinner, and stout enough to hold a hog for butchering. That's what my grand parents had in the kitchen on the farm.

[Frederick Skelly]

"...... with heavy farm-wife legs"

Uh Oh.
Incoming!!!!!!!!!

[Prashun Patel]

Whatever Restoration Hardware or Pottery Barn call it.

Kidding aside, looking back at the thread, it's a bad name. It was inspired by a larger, even more rustic table, but got changed and shrunk along the way.

It should be called, trendy X base with trendy live edge table.

[Bill Adamsen]

Jamie:

Good question. I was so enthralled looking at Prashun's design and build process that the thought never occurred to me. And as Prashun indicates, designs evolve and unless we are conscious about what our naming imparts, we're likely to forget to go back and change. My suspicion is that there is little in the research about furniture built by non-specialists (Wallace Nutting focused on more sophisticated builds). Farmers, typically the "jacks of all trades" by necessity, built with an economy of design and a specific deadline. One envisions slab sided benches and similar tables perhaps built even with nails. To answer the question we need a clear understanding of when this farm table was being made and where. By even the early 19th century, water power drove circular mills and sawn lumber was readily available throughout New England and mid-Atlantic. Likely farmers would have used this sawn wood for their furniture. Before that time likely they'd probably have attempted to source their wood themselves.

We know common attributes of woods popular with farmers would have been, easy to split, easy to work, strong yet lightweight, fastigate (long and straight), insect and rot resistant. Chestnut was a very common wood for farmers to use for a variety of purposes. Used as sills, it was rot resistant. As beams it was strong yet light (similar density to Hemlock and 50% less than White oak). For fence posts it was rot-resistant and easy to split. Eastern white pine was also easy to split and work and could be readily sawn by hand. It had other attributes (low shrinkage, great availability, lightweight) that made it a likely choice. I have seen the latter used extensively in "primitive" tables but rarely the former.

Maybe we can get George Wilson to chip in.