Victorian Entertainment Centers

Victorian Gothic Revival

• You don’t have to love grizzly-looking gargoyles or favor heavy black clothing and makeup to appreciate the Gothic Revival style that marks furnishings produced during the earliest days of Queen Victoria’s reign. Entertainment units made of thick slabs of dark wood that are embellished with spires, arches, and incised trefoils all fall within this distinct style. So if the unit looks like it belongs in a church, you’ve chosen a piece from the era spanning 1830 to 1860.

Victorian Rococo Revival

• Gothic Revival was about a decade old when furniture makers re-introduced Rococo, an ornate style of furniture originating in Italy. Rococo tends to be cluttered with images and symbols, so if you happen upon an entertainment unit that’s over the top, it may belong to this Victorian era, circa 1840 to 1865. Victorian Rococo may only have lasted 25 years, but the impact remains. If the Victorian entertainment center you’ve got your eye on is decorated with incised or bas relief C-scrolls, S-scrolls, flowers, shells, fruit, and myriad other natural shapes, and it is made of walnut or rosewood, you will be displaying the Rococo style.

Victorian Renaissance Revival

• Queen Victoria’s reign was unprecedented; she ruled the United Kingdom from 1837 to 1901, which is why there are so many distinct styles within Victoriana-inspired furniture. Designers introduced Renaissance Revival as something of a backlash to the overabundance of feminine designs that dominated Victorian Rococo furnishings. Renaissance Revival, popular between 1860 and 1890, was just as complex, but instead of feminine shapes, carvings were masculine. Look for inlaid panels, cartouches, animal heads, and even Greek or Roman images if you seek a Victorian Renaissance Revival entertainment unit. You may also spot burl inlaid panels or gilt decorative touches.

Eastlake and Aesthetic Victorian

• The last 20 years of Victorian furniture trending completed the cycle of design that began with Gothic and Rococo pieces. For the last years of Victoria’s life, two furniture design styles called Eastlake and Aesthetic Victorian were all the rage. Craftsmen emphasized rectangular forms, linear cuts, shallowly incised flowers and leaves, and less-complicated engineering to produce end-of-the-century pieces. If you happen upon an entertainment center that emulates this late stage—circa 1880 to 1900—you’ll notice inlays and veneering, a very popular furniture finishing technique that brought to a close this eclectic mix of styles.

Victorian Embellished Furnishings

• As the end of Queen Victoria’s life approached, furniture was produced in factories as often as it was within small craft shops. Thanks to lathing and turning tools, the ornate carvings appearing on furniture throughout Victoria’s six decades were now regularly mass-produced, bringing to an end the grandeur that was Belle Époque European furniture styling. That stated, there were still innovations to be celebrated as this facet of Victorian style came to a close. Iron, used to embellish wood furnishings, became popular. You can find that influence today in reproduction entertainment units covered with tall, stamped brass panels fastened over thick slabs of stained oak.