Day 360 - The Wentworth room



 May 18, 2024

When I enter this room (gallery 711), which was taken from a house in Portsmouth, New Hampshire that was built in 1695-1700 for John Wentworth and his wife, I'm immediately struck by how much grander it seems than the Ipswich room, in spirit if not in scale. (The Wentworth room appears to me to measure about 35 feet long and 20 feet wide.)  For one thing, the fireplace, set against the long wall, is framed by beautiful dark wood paneling. (Such paneling may have lined the other walls as well, but if so, it has disappeared.) The single placard presents only very basic information about the room, but it includes  a QR code, which I dutifully scan, and to my surprise, once I've joined the Met's wifi, the website opens and contains much more detail.  

I have to remind myself that, as with other period rooms, the furnishings in this room didn't come from the Wentworth home. Instead, they reflect  Met curators' knowledge about furniture styles and the curators' judgments about the kinds of items the Wentworths might have owned. The furniture in this room appears much more elaborate than in the Ipswich room, another feature that makes the room seem more upscale.
I learn that the pieces are example of the "William and Mary "style.  The website describes this style as emphasizing vertical lines rather than horizontal ones, but what I especially notice are the many curved lines in the woodwork (when did the jigsaw develop, I wonder?) and the use of caning in several chairs and in a daybed. The veneer on a high chest uses the grain and burls of the wood for highly decorative ends. I prefer the simpler lines of the earlier pieces, but I have to acknowledge that the furnishings here were made to impress, and do.

Like the Ipswich room, this room served multiple purposes - as bedroom, sitting room, and dining room. And as in the earlier room, the furniture could fulfill multiple functions: the daybed could serve as extra seating, a dropleaf table could be opened up or its leaves lowered and the table pushed against a wall. And, astonishing to me, I learn that wingback armchairs like the one in this room sometimes had holes cut in their seats under which chamber pots could be fitted; the chairs thus served double duty as commodes!

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