Joseph Meeks (September 4, 1771 – July 21, 1868) was a

furniture Furniture refers to movable objects intended to support various human activities such as seating (e.g., stools, chairs, and sofas), eating (tables), storing items, eating and/or working with an item, and sleeping (e.g., beds and hammocks). Fu ...

maker in New York City who founded what would become a large firm that produced good quality furniture from 1797 to 1869. In 1833 the firm published a broadsidehttp://metmuseum.org/collection/the-collection-online/search/339865 with an illustration of the firm's building and 39 illustrations, mostly of furniture, but also of window drapery. The furniture is in simplified

American Empire style American Empire is a French-inspired Neoclassical style of American furniture and decoration that takes its name and originates from the Empire style introduced during the First French Empire period under Napoleon's rule. It gained its greates ...

. The broadside includes prices and was intended to be a catalog that consumers could use to order furniture from Meeks. Instead, judging by the large quantities of furniture in the style of the broadside either not signed or known to be by other cabinet makers (e.g.

Thomas Day (North Carolina) Thomas Day (1801–1861) was an American furniture craftsman and cabinetmaker in Milton, Caswell County, North Carolina. Born into a free Black family in Dinwiddie County, Virginia, Day moved to Milton in 1817 and became a highly successful busin ...

all over the east coast of the United States, Meeks's broadside was often used by customers to specify to local cabinet makers what was wanted. Later in Meeks's career, the firm produced Rococo Revival furniture. File:Side Chair MET 199165.jpg, Side chair, laminated rosewood, 1859. File:Side Chair MET 49ll 525r2.jpg, Side chairs, laminated rosewood, 1859. File:Side chair made by Joseph Meeks and Sons, c. 1850-1855, laminated rosewood.JPG, Rococo Revival chair (c. 1850–55). File:Parlor table made by Joseph Meeks and Sons, c. 1860.JPG, Rococo Revival table (c. 1860). File:Center Table MET 170375.jpg, Center table, circa 1825. File:Pier Table MET 170374.jpg, Pier table, circa 1825. File:Pier Table MET DT5332.jpg, Pier table, circa 1829–1835. File:Sofa MET DP323814.jpg, Sofa, 1859.

References

1771 births 1868 deaths American furniture makers {{furniture-stub