“I must needs think of furniture as of two kinds: one part of it being chairs, dining and working tables and the like, the necessary work-a-day furniture in short, which should be of course both well made and well proportioned, but simple to the last degree….But besides this kind of furniture, there is the other kind of what I should call state furniture, which I think is quite proper even for a citizen: I mean sideboards, cabinets and the like, which we have quite as much for beauty’s sake as for use; we need not spare ornament on these, but may make them as elegant and as elaborate as we can with carving, inlaying or painting; these are the blossoms of the art of furniture”.
William Morris – 1882
