Whereas now we buy furniture for modems, once upon a time people bought furniture to hold plants. Here’s a stylish plant stand made in Germany sometime in the 1950s, designer/manufacturer unknown.
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It has the splayed legs that came back into vogue in the mid-century era. That kind of angled leg, which is again seeing a resurgence thanks to Christopher M. Schwarz’s retro-modern furniture and The Anarchist’s Design Book, were originally “staked” legs, i.e. driven directly into a mortise or hole in the seat bottom or tabletop. This hole was traditionally bored at an angle, giving the leg its splay:
Staked high stool, Christopher M. Schwarz
Staked drinking table, Christopher M. Schwarz
Staked drinking table, Christopher M. Schwarz
However, in the case of this plant stand, we can see that the manufacturer drilled plumb holes into blocks of wood, then sliced those blocks in half to produce the angle:
This was presumably done to add strength, for instance if the tabletop was made from particle board, which is a lousy material for mortise-and-tenon joinery. (I initially thought the technique was used to avoid having to build the jig to drill pieces at an angle, but this technique still requires building a jig to precisely saw blocks in half at an angle.)
In any case, we don’t have much information about this table beyond what the eBay seller describes: Its German provenance, and the fact that “The gold shiny rim is plastic.”
While there’s no real gold on this table, the price is dear: $525 with shipping.
Source: core77