A striped sofa, a serious child, and a rather good place to read Alice in Wonderland.
One of the interesting things we’ve noticed about old paintings of sofas is how often books feature.
People are very often reading, or being read to, or holding a book in a manner that suggests they may have given up reading altogether and are now simply staring into the middle distance in a deep, literary sort of way.
This 1879 painting, Alice in Wonderland by George Dunlop Leslie, is a particularly lovely example...
Alice in Wonderland (1879) by George Dunlop Leslie. Image: Brighton & Hove Museums via ArtUK
A woman sits on a marvellously stripey sofa reading Lewis Carroll’s story to a little girl. They both appear to be enjoying the book, albeit with appropriate facial expressions: adults tend to find the Alice books funny, while children often take them very seriously. And even though the little girl isn’t smiling, the abandoned doll suggests she’s fully absorbed in the story, having dropped one imaginary world in favour of another.
Of course, the sofa isn’t the main subject of the painting, but it is very important. It gives them somewhere to sit close together, and turns the story from something being read aloud into something physically shared. Without it, the whole scene would feel rather different – and much less cosy and human.
This is one of the things we like about sofas: they are naturally sociable pieces of furniture. If you think back to the sofas you remember from childhood, they’re not just objects but places where the things of family life happened: stories, films, chickenpox, Christmas afternoons and so on.
At Schplendid, this is the sort of thing that makes us a little serious about furniture. If a sofa is going to be part of all that, it ought to be made properly… made to last long enough to gather a few stories of its own.
That means the things you can’t see matter as much as the things you can: the frame, the springs, the upholstery, and all the general under-the-bonnet business.
A good sofa should be ready for life, trips to Wonderland, and many other places besides…
A Very Good Place to Read Alice
A striped sofa, a serious child, and a rather good place to read Alice in Wonderland.
One of the interesting things we’ve noticed about old paintings of sofas is how often books feature.
People are very often reading, or being read to, or holding a book in a manner that suggests they may have given up reading altogether and are now simply staring into the middle distance in a deep, literary sort of way.
This 1879 painting, Alice in Wonderland by George Dunlop Leslie, is a particularly lovely example...
A woman sits on a marvellously stripey sofa reading Lewis Carroll’s story to a little girl. They both appear to be enjoying the book, albeit with appropriate facial expressions: adults tend to find the Alice books funny, while children often take them very seriously. And even though the little girl isn’t smiling, the abandoned doll suggests she’s fully absorbed in the story, having dropped one imaginary world in favour of another.
Of course, the sofa isn’t the main subject of the painting, but it is very important. It gives them somewhere to sit close together, and turns the story from something being read aloud into something physically shared. Without it, the whole scene would feel rather different – and much less cosy and human.
This is one of the things we like about sofas: they are naturally sociable pieces of furniture. If you think back to the sofas you remember from childhood, they’re not just objects but places where the things of family life happened: stories, films, chickenpox, Christmas afternoons and so on.
At Schplendid, this is the sort of thing that makes us a little serious about furniture. If a sofa is going to be part of all that, it ought to be made properly… made to last long enough to gather a few stories of its own.
That means the things you can’t see matter as much as the things you can: the frame, the springs, the upholstery, and all the general under-the-bonnet business.
A good sofa should be ready for life, trips to Wonderland, and many other places besides…