Sideboards
Early 19th Century French Empire Antique Sideboards
Metal
Late 18th Century American Empire Antique Sideboards
Mahogany, Mirror
19th Century French Napoleon III Antique Sideboards
Marble, Bronze, Brass
1880s French Antique Sideboards
Marble, Ormolu
Early 19th Century American Federal Antique Sideboards
Brass
1870s French Empire Antique Sideboards
Ormolu
Early 19th Century Swedish Scandinavian Modern Antique Sideboards
Pine
Late 20th Century American Empire Sideboards
Brass
Early 19th Century North American American Classical Antique Sideboards
Bone, Elm, Mahogany
Early 20th Century North American Federal Sideboards
Brass
20th Century French Empire Sideboards
Marble
Early 19th Century American Neoclassical Antique Sideboards
Mahogany
Mid-19th Century American American Empire Antique Sideboards
Marble
Early 19th Century American American Colonial Antique Sideboards
Brass
Late 18th Century French Empire Antique Sideboards
Marble
Mid-20th Century French Empire Sideboards
1850s Empire Antique Sideboards
Wood
1930s French Empire Vintage Sideboards
Iron
Antique, New and Vintage Sideboards
Once simply boards made of wood that were used to support ceremonial dining, sideboards have taken on much greater importance since their modest first appearance. In Italy, the sideboard was basically a credenza, a solid furnishing with cabinet doors. It was initially intended as an integral piece of any dining room where the wealthy gathered for meals in the southern European country.
Later, in England and France, sideboards retained their utilitarian purpose — a place to keep hot water for rinsing silverware and from which to serve cold drinking water — but would evolve into double-bodied structures that allowed for the display of serveware and utensils on open shelves. We would likely call these buffets, as they’re taller than a sideboard. (Trust us — there is an order to all of this!)
The sideboard is often deemed a buffet in the United States, from the French buffet à deux corps, which referred to a storage and display case. However, a buffet technically possesses a tiered or shelved superstructure for displaying attractive kitchenware and certainly makes more sense in the context of buffet dining — abundant meals served for crowds of people.
An antique or vintage sideboard today is a sophisticated and stylish component in sumptuous dining rooms of every shape, size and decor scheme, as well as a statement of its own, showcased in art galleries and museums. Furniture maker and artist Paul Evans, whose work has been the subject of various celebrated museum exhibitions, created ornamented, welded and patinated sideboards for Directional Furniture, collections such as the Cityscape series that speak to his place in revolutionary brutalist furniture design as much as they echo the origins of these sturdy, functional structures centuries ago.
If mid-century modern sideboards are more to your liking than an 18th-century mahogany sideboard with decorative inlays by Hepplewhite, the particularly elegant pieces crafted by designers Hans Wegner, Edward Wormley or Florence Knoll are often sought by today’s collectors.
Whether you have a specific era or style in mind or you’re open to browsing a vast collection to find the right fit, 1stDibs has a variety of antique, new and vintage sideboards to choose from.