Statement of Significance
This wooden student desk and seat was purchased in the early seventies, at St. Winifred’s school fete, in Whitton, Middlesex, England by my mother Dorothy Coleman, for the sum of two pounds. It was likely the desk had been used in the primary school. Wooden school desks such as this, with book storage under the hinged writing top and recessed ink well, were used extensively in England in the 1900’s and first half of the twentieth century.
Apart from the enjoyment of buying a bargain and restoring it to its former glory as a lovely piece of furniture, I’m sure in the back of Dorothy’s mind was the anticipation of seeing me bring the desk back to life with studious and disciplined activities in years to come. The painted desk was stripped back revealing the natural ash grain, and began its time in our family as an object to be looked at and enjoyed for its sense of history and natural beauty.
As I came of age, the desk began to be used for writing, drawing and storing books. When I graduated to a more contemporary table, my brother Aeron took over using the desk.
It was in his hands that the future form and the function of the desk would be forever altered. During a bout of procrastination, Aeron casually took a penknife to it. He was not aware of causing damage, on the contrary, he believed he was adding to the desk and continued to make numerous holes in a starburst pattern, whilst anticipating showing off his creative achievement. His handiwork was not as warmly received as he had anticipated. Dorothy was extremely upset at the irreparable damage to the desk, and Aeron’s apparent ‘bad behaviour’ and lack of respect for it. He did not view the object in the same way as Dorothy.
As a result, the lid to the desk was removed, and the desk removed from Aeron. Through these events in 1990, the desk was transformed and assumed a different use, firstly holding pot plants in the hallway and later, books in the bedroom.
The absence of its lid has made it a unique piece of storage furniture, once again an object to be enjoyed for its natural beauty, but also a constant reminder of its emotional history in our family.
The School Desk and Seat
Case Study
My mother Dorothy purchased a wooden student desk and seat in the early seventies, from St. Winifred’s school fete, Whitton, Middlesex, England for the sum of two pounds. This is the story of how the desk’s appearance and use was changed by a simple action of my brother. It is the story of how people view an object differently as a result of how they relate to it, and how this particular object has recorded its own physical history and stored the human emotional history associated with it.
The piece of furniture was heavily coated in white paint and quite unassuming when first spied at the fete, and had probably been used at St. Winifred’s school at some time in the past. Wooden desks such as this were typical of school furniture in the late nineteenth century and into the first half of the twentieth century. The desk has a hinged top which when lifted revealed the hollow body where books and writing materials could be stored. The chair is a simple a rectangular box with tiny feet and minimal padding on its seat, has a very short handle where a back would be, and is of a size only really suitable for a young child. The seat also has a hinged top allowing access to the hollow body for further storage of books. A groove runs across the top of the desk for holding pens and pencils, and a circular hole on the top right for an ink well. Although pens with their own ink supply were perfected late in the nineteenth century, pen and ink writing systems, and hence the ink well, would have still been used well into the twentieth century, particularly by students. The ball point pen would not emerge until 1945.
These practical design features act to define the utility of the desk as a place not only to read and write, but also to store the implements associated with these activities. It carries with it a sense of ownership, a child’s ‘little office’ or place of work. When I look at these desks an image of an early twentieth century classroom is conjured up, with rows of identical desks, one for each student. No doubt many such desks had over time been sold, passed on or thrown out by schools as they were superseded by cheaper, more efficient designs. The labour necessary to produce a wooden piece of furniture such as this, whether handmade or machine cut was made more efficient by cost effective mass production of steel frame tables and plastic or plywood stackable chairs, which were common place after World War II. Certainly not considered an antique of great value, it was still attractive to my Mother as having a history, and she would have had a respect for its more handcrafted appearance in comparison to similar items of the day.
Apart from the anticipation of buying a bargain and restoring it to its former glory as a lovely piece of wooden furniture, I’m sure in the back of my mother’s mind was also the anticipation of the beginning of my school years, which were just around the corner. This would be an opportunity for her to see me bring the desk back to life with studious and disciplined activities. The layers of white paint were stripped back by hand to reveal the natural ash grain, and so it began its time in our family as an object to be looked at and enjoyed for its sense of history and aesthetic beauty. When I was big enough to sit at it, I began to use the desk for the purpose it was designed. I imagine the thought of their first son beginning his school years with his own personal wooden school desk filled my parents with pride.
My personal memory of the desk is not very detailed, but carries memories of childhood, the excitement and anxiety of learning, and the comforting warmth of the wood grain. I used the desk for many years, until a house move allowed me to have my own room and a built in work surface. This was out of necessity for spreading out books and papers as I entered my teenage years. My younger brother of four and a half years took over using the desk at this time. It was at the hands of Aeron that the future form and the function of the desk would be forever altered. He had been using the desk for some time, storing his books in it and using it for working at, much in the same way as I had. His recollection of using the desk includes details such as the ink well which he remembers as a ‘black hole’. A place where things like pencil shavings, paper clips, dust and dirt would accumulate. He was perhaps not aware that it was originally intended for an inkpot. This would have been outside his experience and consciousness of the desk, and so it took on a mystical charm that obviously stuck in his memory. Aeron had recently been given a penknife by our father. An object which at the age of 11 created a certain amount of excitement. During what can be best described as a bout of procrastination or boredom, Aeron had the strong urge to put the penknife to use. He began by dropping the knife into the desk lid, and found that by rotating it, it dug out of the desk a ‘wonderful’ cone shaped hole. He recalls not being aware of causing damage. On the contrary, he believed he was adding to the plain old desk and continued to make numerous holes in a starburst pattern, whilst anticipating showing mum his creative achievement. It was not as warmly received as Aeron had expected, but instead evoked an emotional response in Dorothy that Aeron describes as the most upset she has ever been with him.
He was truly surprised at the level of her emotion, and though it may not have taken long to realise that intentionally damaging the desk was wrong, he would not have comprehended the way that Dorothy viewed the desk and her own emotional connection to it. He was just a child, with no appreciation of its history or aesthetic value. She on the other hand had bought the desk almost 15 years prior, stripped it herself, and over that time admired it for it’s aesthetic qualities. She would also have carried the unconscious assumption that it should be used for studious activities as the desk is implicitly linked to the idea and action of focused work. You sit at a desk to achieve something, to perform a task, and digging a hole in the lid is not one of them!
In addition, unlike a table, you only sit at a desk one way, with one orientation. The act of sitting at a desk faces you in a particular direction and carries with it a structure and organization. With regards to a school desk from this era, one inherently carries the image mentioned earlier of all the classroom desks perfectly aligned, each student sitting behind their desk, studiously facing the teacher. The result is that the desk creates a division between the user or owner, and someone they might engage with. This aspect is perhaps most apparent these days in business, where the division creates a feeling of authority and a difference in status. In this way, the desk has come to represent the control of power. In the case of the school desk it is reversed, with the person behind the desk assuming the subservient role. Though the school desk may have been transported from the schoolroom scenario into the home, it is possible these associations with the desk together with the relationship of mother and son, only served to amplify Aeron’s destructive misbehaviour in the eyes of Dorothy.
The lid of the desk was subsequently removed. Finding a replacement lid or piece of wood would have allowed the desk to maintain its function. With no lid or writing surface, the desk could no longer be used for its intended purpose, and this left its hollow body exposed. It could have been thrown out, but Dorothy’s affection for the desk prevented this from happening, and so as a result, a new use was found for it. It became a plant pot holder and took up residence in the hall way. Its form and function had changed, and in doing so it was now more clearly defined than ever as an object enjoyed purely as a piece of wooden furniture. As a plant pot holder it lost the austerity it had as a desk, and helped by the foliage springing from its form, it softened.
However, Aeron’s ‘creative actions’ with the penknife are forever recorded by the desk in its physical form. The absence of its lid is a constant reminder of its intended use, and particularly for Aeron and Dorothy, a reminder of the emotional experience associated with the desk. In more recent years its role has poetically hinted back to its origins. It now holds books, and resides in my parents’ bedroom. Whether a conscious thought or not, it is interesting to ponder if Dorothy’s understandably strong emotional reaction to the deformation of the desk resulted in its complete change of use, only to soften with time, and for the desk to find a more comfortable role closer to home.
Images courtesy of author
References
NELSON, R. (1990) Toward a Philosophy of Furniture
Wikipedia, (2007) (First Accessed 24/4/07)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/School_desk
antiques.search.ebay.com/ school-desk_Desks_W0QQsacatZ63569 - 113k
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