Chippendale vs Rococo
チッペンデール / ロココ
Chippendale comes from Furniture and Interiors and Rococo from Historical Styles. They are reached for with some of the same intent, which is where they get confused.
Chippendale
English furniture of the 1750s and 1760s, made to the designs of the cabinetmaker Thomas Chippendale, whose name then became the name of the style. Getty also records it as the Director Style. The framework stays largely Rococo, and what identifies a piece is openwork and ornamental carving gathered into the chair back and the legs.
Rococo
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Turned Baroque grandeur toward interior intimacy: shell-like curves, pale color and asymmetrical ornament composing a light-footed social space. One of the first styles in which decoration broke free of architecture to take the lead.
| Chippendale | Rococo | |
|---|---|---|
| Era | 1750s–1760s | 1730s–1770s |
| Family | Furniture and Interiors | Historical Styles |
| Kind | Style | Style |
| Cues | Chair backs pierced with openwork rather than left as solid splats, so the wall shows through / Carved ornament gathered along edges and legs, leaving few flat surfaces / Rococo curves carried through the legs and top rail instead of square corners / Ornament cut out of the thickness of the wood, not applied to its face | Rocaille shell curves / Pale pastels / Asymmetrical ornament / Mirrored white-and-gold rooms |
| Best used for | Deciding how a chair back should be pierced when recreating an English drawing room or study · Explaining to a maker how a heavily carved commission should differ from plain Rococo | Turning a small room into a light and intimate setting for company · Letting ornament run free of structure and set the character at the edges |
| Type | Furniture carries no lettering. On drawings or labels, set a fine roman close to eighteenth century English engraving, kept small. | Fine script curves following the line of the frame |
| Composition | Hold the front elevation symmetrical and let the pierced back take the eye. Run the curve of the legs and the top rail as one continuous line. | Asymmetry throughout, with corners dissolved by ornament at the edges |
| Material | Cut the openwork and carving from solid wood rather than applying ornament to the face. Finish so the grain still reads. | Pale blue and pink walls carrying slender white and gold relief |
| Caution | Spreading the carving evenly across every surface breaks the balance the style needs, where ornament concentrates in one place and the rest stays plain. | Adding the curves and the gold while keeping everything symmetrical, which yields nothing but a heavy formal Baroque in miniature. |