Material Matters: BAMBOO
This sustainable, elegant and multi-purpose material is experiencing a huge revival but, as Ellie Tennant nds out, it’s not for the rst time…
From super-so socks to eco ooring, bamboo is fast becoming the go-to choice for contemporary design. Few materials can rival the versatility of this perennial giant grass with its hollow, circular stems. It’s a ordable, has a tensile strength stronger than steel and is far more sustainable than many alternatives. Fast-growing compared to timber, bamboo helps to reduce excess carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and produces more oxygen than hardwood trees such as walnut or oak. It also grows without the need for pesticides or fertilisers. Add to these impressive credentials the inherent natural beauty of honey-hued bamboo and it’s easy to understand why this material has gone mainstream – at the end of 2019, Ikea reported that bamboo had become one of the store’s bestselling materials.
Where the plant is indigenous, humans have long-known about bamboo’s qualities and have used it to make basic objects and weapons for thousands of years, but it’s di cult to know when bamboo furniture was rst produced. A bamboo chair was rst recorded in China in the Song dynasty era (960-1279), but few early pieces of bamboo furniture survive. Writing in
The Chair in China (Toronto, 1952), Louise Hawley Stone points out that: ‘China’s history of res, oods, and wars has not been conducive to the preservation of such a fragile thing as wooden furniture.’ However, one good surviving example of early bamboo furniture can be found in The Palace Museum, Beijing, which has a rather impressive set of c1644 speckled bamboo chairs.
Regency Trend
Bamboo rst captured the Western imagination in the 16th century, when travellers to the exotic Far East sent back tales of a strange tree-like grass. When China eased its restrictions on foreign trade in 1684, Chinese bamboo, along with silk and porcelain, ooded into the West and
savvy Europeans soon began to imitate Eastern designs. This ‘chinoiserie’ style was all the rage among the wealthier classes and English stately homes and palaces o en had a ‘Chinese Room’. The National Trust’s Claydon House in Buckinghamshire is a ne example, with elegant carvings by Luke Lightfoot and bamboo furniture.
‘Bamboo furniture was very fashionable in England in the Regency period,’ reveals John Bly, dealer and Antiques Roadshow expert. ‘The nest bamboo furniture was imported to the Royal Pavilion in Brighton.’ Bamboo motifs can be found throughout the whole building. ‘You can still see bamboo armchairs in the South Gallery today,’ says John. ‘They came at-packed and the sta had to assemble them. They never really caught on and little more was seen of bamboo until the Japanese Meiji government opened up trade with the West in 1868.’
Victorian Obsession
The British had already got a taste for Japanese style at the second great exhibition in London in 1862, when Sir Rutherford Alcock, ambassador to Japan, showed an inspiring collection of art. ‘Japanese style had a tranquil quality and was unlike anything people had ever seen before,’ explains John. ‘For 4,000 years, Japan had been insulated from the rest of the world. These pieces conjured up a far-o utopia, brought within the reach of every front room via a little table with a lacquered top, a sunshade, a fan, a scroll or a screen. The desire for this taste coincided with the Arts and Crafts movement and was furthered by
Godwin, Leech, Dresser, Burges and Whistler,’ adds John. ‘It was much encouraged by Gilbert and Sullivan’s The
Mikado, which opened at the Savoy Theatre 6 in 1885.’
In her book Bamboo
Style (Gibbs Smith,
2002), Gale Beth
Goldberg notes that England registered
around 150 bamboo furniture manufacturers during a period of nearly 65 years in the late 1800s and early 1900s. Victorian homes were soon awash with bamboo hallstands, plant stands, side tables, chairs, photo frames, magazine racks, sheet music holders and cabinets, some with lacquered, rattan or cloth panels. Today, smaller pieces can be picked up relatively inexpensively.
Expect to pay around £300-£500 for a small bamboo item such as an umbrella stand or rescreen and up to £21,000 for eight matching chairs.
‘It wasn’t all made of real bamboo,’ says John. ‘They turned all sorts of timber and carved it to look like bamboo. American makers preferred maple, while British rms o en used beech.’ Like most fashions, the fad faded and bamboo furniture fell out of favour in later years.
In the 1960s and 1970s, bamboo was back in vogue. Vintage bamboo buys from this era are highly sought a er today – think kitsch bamboo ‘Tiki’ bars with Formica tops, cutlery with bamboo handles, hostess trolleys and plant stands. ‘Bamboo is having a comeback,’ agrees John. ‘A single piece can look quite outstanding.’
‘Japanese pieces conjured up a far-o utopia.’
Turn the page for essential expert advice on collecting bamboo brush pots