Rococo, less commonly Roccoco, also known as Late Baroque, is an exceptionally ornamental and dramatic style of architecture, art and decoration which combines asymmetry, scrolling curves, gilding, white and pastel colours, sculpted moulding, and trompe-l'œil frescoes to create surprise and the illusion of motion and drama. It is often described as the final expression of the Baroque movement.
Thomas Chippendale (1718–1779) was a cabinet-maker in London, designing furniture in the mid-Georgian, English Rococo, and Neoclassical styles. In 1754 he published a book of his designs in a trade catalogue titled The Gentleman and Cabinet Maker's Director—the most important collection of furniture designs published in England to that point which created a mass market for furniture—upon which success he became renowned. According to the Victoria and Albert Museum, "so influential were his designs, in Britain and throughout Europe and America, that 'Chippendale' became a shorthand description for any furniture similar to his Director designs".
George Hepplewhite was a cabinetmaker. He is regarded as having been one of the "big three" English furniture makers of the 18th century, along with Thomas Sheraton and Thomas Chippendale. There are no pieces of furniture made by Hepplewhite or his firm known to exist but he gave his name to a distinctive style of light, elegant furniture that was fashionable between about 1775 and 1800 and reproductions of his designs continued through the following centuries. One characteristic that is seen in many of his designs is a shield-shaped chair back, where an expansive shield appeared in place of a narrower splat design.
Jean-Henri Riesener was a famous German ébéniste (cabinetmaker), working in Paris, whose work exemplified the early neoclassical "Louis XVI style".
A commode is any of many pieces of furniture. The Oxford English Dictionary has multiple meanings of "commode". The first relevant definition reads: "A piece of furniture with drawers and shelves; in the bedroom, a sort of elaborate chest of drawers ; in the drawing room, a large kind of chiffonier." The drawing room is itself a term for a formal reception room, and a chiffonier is, in this sense, a small sideboard dating from the early 19th century.
Robert Ralph Parsons is an American entrepreneur, billionaire, and philanthropist. In 1997, he founded the GoDaddy group of companies, including domain name registrar GoDaddy.com, reseller registrar Wild West Domains, and Blue Razor Domains. In July 2011, Parsons sold approximately 70 percent of GoDaddy to a private equity consortium and resigned his position as CEO. In June 2014, he stepped down from his position as Executive Chairman and served on the board until 2018.
A chest of drawers, also called a dresser or a bureau, is a type of cabinet that has multiple parallel, horizontal drawers generally stacked one above another.
William Vile was an English cabinetmaker.
Joseph Calleia was a Maltese-born American actor and singer on the stage and in films, radio and television.
André-Charles Boulle, le joailler du meuble, became the most famous French cabinetmaker and the preeminent artist in the field of marquetry, also known as "inlay". Boulle was "the most remarkable of all French cabinetmakers". Jean-Baptiste Colbert recommended him to Louis XIV of France, the "Sun King", as "the most skilled craftsman in his profession". Over the centuries since his death, his name and that of his family has become associated with the art he perfected, the inlay of tortoiseshell, brass and pewter into ebony. It has become known as Boulle work, and the École Boulle, a college of fine arts and crafts and applied arts in Paris, continues today to bear testimony to his enduring art, the art of inlay.
Sir Lawrence Dundas, 1st Baronet was a Scottish merchant, politician and planter.
Richard Neville Hartley is an English composer, best known for his work on The Rocky Horror Show. He grew up in Holmfirth.
The Great Automatic Grammatizator is a collection of thirteen short stories written by British author Roald Dahl. The stories were selected for teenagers from Dahl's adult works. All the stories included were published elsewhere originally; their sources are noted below. The stories, with the exception of the war story "Katina", possess a deadpan, ironic, bizarre, or even macabre sense of humor. They generally end with unexpected plot twists.
James Joseph Parsons is an American actor. From 2007 to 2019, he played Sheldon Cooper in the CBS sitcom The Big Bang Theory. He has received various awards, including four Primetime Emmy Awards for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Comedy Series and the Golden Globe Award for Best Actor in a Television Series Musical or Comedy. In 2018, Forbes estimated his annual salary to be $26.5 million and named him the world's highest-paid television actor.
Geppetto, also known as Mister Geppetto, is an Italian fictional character in the 1883 novel The Adventures of Pinocchio by Carlo Collodi. Geppetto is an elderly, impoverished woodcarver and the creator of Pinocchio. He wears a yellow wig resembling cornmeal mush, and consequently his neighbors call him "Polendina" to annoy him. The name Geppetto is a Tuscan diminutive of the name Giuseppe.
Benjamin Goodison, of London, was a royal cabinetmaker to George II of Great Britain, supplying furnishings to the royal palaces from 1727 to the time of his death. He served his apprenticeship with James Moore, who died accidentally in October 1726; Moore was the pre-eminent London cabinetmaker during the reign of George I. Goodison's classicizing case furniture owes much of its inspiration to the neo-Palladian designs of William Kent; outstanding documented examples are the pair of part-gilded mahogany commodes and library writing-tables Goodison made for Sir Thomas Robinson of Rokeby Hall, Yorkshire, now in the Royal Collection; they have boldly-scaled Greek key fret in their friezes and lion masks gripping brass rings heading scrolling consoles at their corners.
Bernard II van Risamburgh, sometimes Risen Burgh was a Parisian ébéniste of Dutch and French extraction, one of the outstanding cabinetmakers working in the Rococo style. "Bernard II's furniture is brilliant in almost every respect. His carcasses are beautifully shaped, his mounts and marquetry are always in complete balance even when extremely elaborate, and there is a logic to his works that allows the eye to comprehend them effortlessly," wrote Ted Dell.
Thirty-Minute Theatre was a British anthology drama series of short plays shown on BBC Television between 1965 and 1973, which was used in part at least as a training ground for new writers, on account of its short running length, and which therefore attracted many writers who later became well known. It was produced initially by Harry Moore, later by Graeme MacDonald, George Spenton-Foster, Innes Lloyd and others.
Jacob Cress, better known as Jake Cress, is a furniture maker in Fincastle, Virginia who is known for his interpretations of classical 18th century furniture. He considers himself to be a cabinet maker and not an artist. He also builds normal classical furniture, miniature furniture, and carves boxes, as well as decorative pieces. He also restores furniture. Additionally, he builds more modern pieces like country tables and desks. Cress works with mahogany, walnut, and cherry woods. His animated works include "The Decorator," "Alladin's Lamp," "Hickory Dickory Dock Clock," "Self-Portrait," and "Clock Face." Cress crafts each piece of furniture by hand in his shop without sketching the furniture before he begins working on it.
The furniture of the Louis XV period (1715–1774) is characterized by curved forms, lightness, comfort and asymmetry; it replaced the more formal, boxlike and massive furniture of the Louis XIV style. It employed marquetry, using inlays of exotic woods of different colors, as well as ivory and mother of pearl.
