Walter Cave Piano

Emerging in reaction to industrialization and mass production, the Arts and Crafts movement celebrated handcrafted design as a part of daily life. The history of Arts and Crafts furniture has roots in 1860s England with an emphasis on natural motifs and simple flourishes like mosaics and carvings. This work is characterized by plain construction that showcases the hand of the artisan.

The earliest American Arts and Crafts furniture dates back to the start of the 20th century. Designers working in this style in the United States initially looked to ideas put forth by The Craftsman, a magazine published by Wisconsin native Gustav Stickley, a furniture maker and founder of the Craftsman style. Stickley’s furniture was practical and largely free of ornament. His Craftsman style drew on French Art Nouveau as well as the work he encountered on his travels in England. There, the leading designers of the Arts and Crafts movement included William Morris, who revived historical techniques such as embroidery and printed fabrics in his furnishings, and Charles Voysey, whose minimal approach was in contrast to the ornamentation favored in the Victorian era.

American Arts and Crafts work would come to involve a range of influences unified by an elevation of traditional craftsmanship. The furniture was often built from sturdy woods like oak and mahogany while featuring details such as inlaid metal, tooled leather and ceramic tiles. The style in the United States was led by Stickley, whose clean-lined chairs and benches showcased the grain of the wood, and furniture maker Charles Rohlfs, who was informed by international influences like East Asian and French Art Nouveau design.

Hubs in America included several utopian communities such as Rose Valley in Pennsylvania and the Byrdcliffe Arts and Crafts Colony in New York, where craftspeople made furniture that prioritized function over any decoration. Their work would influence designers and architects including Frank Lloyd Wright, who built some of the most elegant and iconic structures in the United States and likewise embraced a thoughtful use of materials in his furniture.

Find antique Arts and Crafts chairs, tables, cabinets and other authentic period furniture on 1stDibs.

Pay tribute to a history of rich and diverse musical traditions that have taken shape all over the world by decorating your home with a collection of antique and vintage musical instruments.

Whether you’re playing them or merely displaying them, vintage musical instruments, when cared for properly, can be a wonderful addition to any space. At between four and five feet in length, an elegant early-1900s Steinway & Sons baby grand piano will undoubtedly steal the show if you’re thinking of yielding some precious real estate to one of these American classics, but maybe you’re simply shopping for art to warm the bare walls of your new apartment or weekend home.

For your living room, maybe you’ve already hunted down portraits by Gered Mankowitz, a celebrated 1960s-era photographer who spent his life capturing iconic images of music’s biggest stars. If you’ve got more space to work with there — or perhaps you need some entertainment room ideas — consider positioning an old guitar as a focal point. If a room has no distinguishing architectural features, you could create a prominent focal point with trending paint colors, stylish shelving, an arrangement of flowers or by wall-mounting a spectacularly aging early-20th-century guitar or other stringed instrument.

Alternatively, much in the way that you might group a collection of artwork to hang salon-style, with a little help from strong hanging wire or some wall hooks, vintage brass instruments such as a gong, French horn or trumpet can help elevate a home office or complement the efforts you’ve made to ensure a welcoming vibe in your home’s entryway. Bells or antique wind instruments can add provocative metallic contrasts to dark woods as tabletop decorative objects. Think of them as eye-catching ornamental flourishes that you can bring to end tables in a common area, to the top of a desk or to a mid-century storage cabinet.

Bring culture and creativity into your space with decades-old plywood tabletop radios or musical instruments from all over the world — be they drums from Africa or harps from France. Even if you’re not exactly getting the band back together, we can promise that the range of antique and vintage instruments on 1stDibs can help strike a meaningful chord in your interior design plan.