What am I?

Part of the fun of finding a "treasure" (or to some, trash) is trying to figure out where it came from, how old it is, who made it, and is it worth anything?  After a fun jaunt to the flea market with my girlfriends, I sat and stared at this little table I got for $5 (it seemed like a great deal at the time) and realized it is basically a Frankenstein of a mess of a piece of furniture.  Instead of being one particular type, it seems to be many different parts all throw together into one. 

A good place to start when you are trying to figure out a piece of furniture is to study the legs.  Googling "table legs" will bring up many different kinds of legs on tables so you can somewhat identify what style your table is.  This isn't foolproof for identifying the authenticity or age of something, but it will give you a start on the style, reproduction or real thing  (that is a whole other issue)... Queen Anne, Victorian, Louis xv, whatever...the legs are a great clue...in my case, the legs are straight with a long vertical lines carved in them...of course I can't find anything on the internet about that. 

Another clue to whether something is an antique or not is the hardware.  My table also has drop down sides.  That is popular on many antiques.  In the case of my table, the little swing out parts that keep up the sides are kept in place with two plain nails.  I am guessing the lack of real hardware indicates that it was handmade and not by machine.  The man at the flea market guessed it was made in the 1940s but who the heck knows if he knew what he was talking about.

What really confuses me about this table is the mixed styling.  The crossed supports on the bottom are quite fancy and perhaps were added later, since they look like they are machine cut.  To me they look victorian?  There are also little corner decorations that look victorian.  And then there is the rope detailing on the front and back. 

Someone had already sanded it down, so I guess there is no sense in trying to keep the integrity of the table up.  Maybe I shouldn't think so hard about it and just have fun painting it!!!

And to close, I would like to share the great Paul Simon's words:

"One man's ceiling is another man's floor"