Hi I need help with this chair!

I just posted in introduction forum too. I'm trying to figure out how to work this site so bare with me, and I apologize. But I had bough six of these chairs earlier today for 100 dollars total. The seller told me they were made of mahogany and suspects they are from 1890-1900. There are very large coil springs in the seat. There are no stamps, labels or tags anywhere on the seat. If you could point me in the right direction I'd much appreciate it!

 

Circa 1890 transitional between the Renaissance Revival style and the Eastlake style. Think they are probably birch with a dark stain to mimic mahogany or walnut.

 

Thanks so much. Any idea on how much theyd be worth if I were to fix it up?

 

Brown furniture isnt selling well at all right now,they are probably worth about what you paid. Thats considering your location,of course.

 

Well, you paid 16.6666666666 a chair.
Fixed up in today's market here in CA about 25 -35 a chair. So you would double your money. Question is how much time will you end up putting in to fix up, and are you going to recover the seats?

 

well i planned on painting it white, and replacing the seats as well. I was just wondering if it would be worth more to leave it as is and polish it up or if it would just be better to do my original plan which seems like to best way to go. I just wanted to make sure that the time era was right so I could have a little history on the chair but it seems like thats about all im going to get here.

 

Well Brad confirmed the time period for you in his post. And I agree that the wood is probably stained, but I can't tell you what kind of wood it is.

If you were looking for a maker, sorry, most of these types of chairs are not attributed to specific makers. Fairly common manufactured turn of the century chairs.

 

Have fun with them. Paint 'em up.

Debora

 

If you're going to sell them, definitely go with painted (coming from me, a lover of dark wood). It's hotter than hot right now. The color would depend on where you will be selling them. I'm a decorative artist (NJ transplanted to Florida) and anything white, coral, light green, aqua or blue flies out of the stores. I think it would be the same near any coastal area. It would be awesome to paint them white, and 'pick out' the details on the backs in subtle colors.

Edited to add:
My Northeast sensibility says that they'd also look great painted black with touches of gold in the design, just enough to show the details. Nothing shiny, something like Rub n Buff that's not too bright.