Queen anne pulls

[Jim Kountz]

Well gang Im about to the hardware choosing portion of my queen anne lowboy build. Ive been scouring the various websites, Ball and Ball, Horton Brasses and some others. Im having a hard time deciding on which ones to use. There are so many darn choices.
The wood is walnut, the design is from FWW #201 as built by Phil Lowe. I shot him an email about where he got his from but never heard back, guess ol Phil is a busy man!!
So I just wanted to pick some brains here before I made a decision and see if anyone had any they particuarly liked for this application and where I might find them. I guess Im partial to a bail style pull since thats what I see more of on originals Ive studied.
Any help is much appreciated!!

[David Keller NC]

Jim - Though not an exact match, the brasses on Phil's lowboy are very similar to Londonderry's QA35 and QA36:

http://www.londonderry-brasses.com/Pg030.html

Another slightly fancier choice would be QA56 from the same supplier.

If, by the way, authenticity matters to you, I know of no examples made in the Queen Anne style in the major urban centers in the colonies that have anything other than bail pulls. And that's out of several hundred examples in books in my library that I've looked through. Generally speaking, all Queen Anne brasses are "bat wings" with the distinctive swell on the two upper corners of the bail plate.

However, I'll note that what Phil published as plans in FWW 201 is not authentic in the strictest sense - several details about the construction would be extremely rare to non-existent on furniture from the day. It's not that Phil's modifications are inconsistent with period construction, it's just that you would not see these attributes outside of London.

So..."authenticity" may not be a useful criteria to you, in which case, to my eye, several of the less-ornate chippendale styles of bail pulls, or even neo-classical bails might be to your taste.

[Jim Kountz]

Thanks for the info Dave, I checked those pulls out, man they are pricey though arent they? Whats your thoughts on these:
http://www.horton-brasses.com/store/handlespulls/drawerpulls/queenannedrawer/queenannechased
And what about "chased"? Im of course looking at the bright brass not the antique brass thats pictured on the website.

[Robert Rozaieski]

Have you checked out White Chapel?

http://www.whitechapel-ltd.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=CTGY&Category_Code=pplthndl

[Charles Murray Ohio]

Jim,

I just requested a catalog from: http://www.optimumbrasses.co.uk/index.htm

Their prices look good. I found them while on http://www.sapfm.org/ If your not a member, it will be the best $35.00 you will ever spend.

Charles

[David Keller NC]

Thanks for the info Dave, I checked those pulls out, man they are pricey though arent they? Whats your thoughts on these:
http://www.horton-brasses.com/store/handlespulls/drawerpulls/queenannedrawer/queenannechased
And what about "chased"? Im of course looking at the bright brass not the antique brass thats pictured on the website.

Well, I suppose that depends on how you calculate "value". In my case, after spending a 100 hours or so on a piece, the hardware cost is pretty low, no matter what I (or a customer) chooses.

The "chased" part is hand-engraving a design on the back-plate. That seems to have been really popular in the William and Mary era, but a whole lot less common in the QA style, and almost non-existant in Chippendale pieces. Of course, the line between W&M, QA and Chippendale is not a bright one - there was a lot of cross-pollination and "holdovers" in American furniture.

Honestly, I don't understand how Horton can offer hand-chased brasses for $13 each - they must have an army of schoolkids that will work for $6 an hour to make any money on them.

Also, I am not sure if this applies to all of what Horton and Ball&Ball produce, but the ones I've gotten before uniformly had modern machined threaded posts and hex nuts, which makes them immediately obvious as reproductions.

That's a personal choice, though - I prefer someone to have to know their stuff to be able to tell a repro I make from the originals. Other craftsmen don't care - the overall look is what's important.

[Jim Kountz]

Honestly, I don't understand how Horton can offer hand-chased brasses for $13 each - they must have an army of schoolkids that will work for $6 an hour to make any money on them.



Thats what I was thinking too, I mean there must be a reason why some cost over $30 and some are less then $15. If it walks like a duck..........
Im going to mull over this for another day or two then make a decision. Thanks for all your help guys.

[David Keller NC]

Thats what I was thinking too, I mean there must be a reason why some cost over $30 and some are less then $15. If it walks like a duck..........
Im going to mull over this for another day or two then make a decision. Thanks for all your help guys.

I don't know that much about the manufacturing process that Horton uses (these may be cut out of sheet brass, which would be cheaper), but I do know that the Londonderry products are made by a process carefully modeled after the way the originals were done - they are all sand-cast, with the fronts buffed clean. The posts and nuts are also cast, as were the originals. The process, and the attention to alloy composition may explain part of the price differential.

[Orion Henderson]

Hi all, I own Horton Brasses. I have been seeing a lot of referrals to my site from here and thought I should join. I am NOT here to sell my stuff or advertise. However, if you have hardware questions I would be happy to help. I will recommend other sources of hardware too-not just my own. mostly though I would like to make myself available as a resource. Don't hesitate to ask anything at all. I will help wherever I can.

Anyway, with regards to this thread. Jim-thank you! David Keller is correct on the production of our pulls and the rest. We stamp the plates from brass that is .040" thick (about the thickness of a dime)-then bevel the edges, and flatten. The bails are cast and the posts are turned. The chasing is put in by hand with our original tools. The tools all date from the late 1920's to early 1930's. My great grandfather made it all from scratch-the chasing tools and virtually every punch and die we use. Ball and Ball casts some of their brasses and stamps others. They tell you which ones in their catalog-you can also tell by the price. Londonderry is Optimum Brasses' reseller in the US. They cast exclusively and do make some beautiful parts.

We use stamping, turning, and casting as appropriate based on cost, accuracy, and practical application (consistency matters a lot to our production oriented customers). There are choices to be made-we choose to make a high quality product with a little more consistency than fully cast parts and a lower cost. Nothing wrong with either method IMH0-just different methods with different goals. Casting is the historically correct production method for Chippendale, Queen Anne, and William & Mary hardware. Historically accurate castings are generally very thin and somewhat irregular. I believe Ball and Ball has thickened things up a bit to suit current tastes-but I am not sure. We stamp from thicker brass for the same reason-though we have been using .040" brass for "bat wings" since my great grandfathers day. Hepplewhite plates were not cast-they were the height of stamping technology in their day and most plates after the early 1800's would have been stamped as the industrial revolution got under way.

We do make the pulls here in our Connecticut factory.

[Joel Goodman]

Thank you Orion for joining in -- it's great when manufacturers participate in the threads.

[Cliff Rohrabacher]

Have you checked White Chapel?

[Jim Kountz]

Well welcome aboard the Creek Orion, I just now about 10 minutes ago received my order from you guys and wanted to tell you the pulls are amazing!! The quality is first rate and the packaging was more than sufficient. I got my order in three days which I also thought was excellent. I got the chased bright brass pulls and they are magnificent!!

Thanks!!