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Reading Bob's thread about red & black & concreting brought back memories about heraldry & crests & flags and their colour rules which I thought might be appreciated here!
White and yellow/orange are the metals silver and gold.
All other colours are just colours (this includes black for the purposes of this argument)
No metal can touch/adjoin another metal, and no colour may touch/adjoin another colour.
i.e. colours must be surrounded by white or yellow, (metals) before another colour is reached, and vice versa. This can be via panels, outlines or your imagination, they just can't touch their own kind.
Maybe it stems from enamelling coats-of-arms on shields, where the metal was the border of all colours, and colours were 'coloured in' in places the way kids do in colouring-in books. That's just my guess there.
-------------------- "Stewey" on chat
"...there are no limits when you aim for perfection..." Jonathan Livingston Seagull Posts: 7014 | From: Highgrove via Toowoomba, Queensland, Australia | Registered: Dec 2002
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Thanks Ian... good info! I'd love to see someone update the carriage decorating book of design with some modern photos and new-old information.
I think you'd be a great addition for a revised copy of that book. Drag along some of these other folks here who also have years of experience with this sorta thing. I've met some folks recently with a collection and refinishing without a clue about the period style artwork.
Jeff Ogden must have a pile of photos!
-------------------- "No excuses!.... No regrets!..."
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Where can one find the carriage decorating book? Painting crests and heraldry on carriages was my great-grandfather's profession before he came to Canada from England. I would really love to learn of this and any other books/info on this subject, as I always wanted to know more about what he did. I never knew him or any details of the art. Things sure do trickle down through the generations, though, without us really knowing it! Thanks for the thread and the info! Erica
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I have some books here... gotta run but thought I'd make a quicky pop in here.... The carriage society of America has a great listing of books.... I can get specific names of mine later tonight. (still in boxes from moving) Here is a good link...
"Practical Carraige and Wagon Painting" by M.C.Hillick. It has all the old paint formulas, and gives you a pretty good idea of just how skilled a carraige painter was. Lots of details...some graphics too. Geet, are those the embellishments ya'll were talking about? The one's in this book?
It's $17.95...call them at 1-866-543-3045 to order or ask for catalogue. They have alot of old book reprints.
-------------------- Jeff Ogden 8727 NE 68 Terr. Gainesville FL, 32609 Posts: 2138 | From: 8827 NE 68 Terr Gainesville Fl 32609 | Registered: Aug 2002
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Thanks for those listings- I've got all of them, and some! I wondered whether there was a 'new' one or a newly available 'old' one.
They are all OK, IMHO, and good to have, but not what I'd call "outstanding".
One of the biggest problems I see here with people striping horse drawn vehicles is dreadful/gareish colour combinations, boldness on vehicles where a subdued taste is needed, oversized scrolls improperly placed (eg a small simple design blown up to say 3 or 5 times its size and used as a feature- yuk- when the original design was one of enhancement rather than dominance for that particular scroll.)
There is/are/were some beautiful work about, and some terrible attempts too!
One old book I have says that carriage painters (of trade or business vehicles) considered themselves in a trade 'above' that of the 'ordinary' signpainter, since their work had to be instantly legible while on a moving billboard, yet also be fancy and tasteful. Whereas a pedestrian can pause in passing to read the work on a shopfront. [that was how they worded the explanation]
No one I am aware of has done a good (published) analysis of styles & schemes that do & don't suit certain types of vehicles. Passenger vehicles in England had a certain 'look' and certain combinations of stripe sizes & colours were common there which would be disliked in Australia. Passenger vehicles here often had more ornate work, far finer, sometimes in very obvously contrasting colours, but which from 8 feet away disappear totally under a squint test. Others had paliner but very subdued styles. It all depends on the era of construction & the type of vehicle. Yankee stuff evolved its own styles too.
Trade vehicles were a different kettle of fish & some really nice stuff happens (or happened) here. Again some styles & colours work & some don't. Modern 'truck' scrolls are altogether wrong IMHO. Trade vehicles in England were often almost as subdued in their ornamentation as Aussie passenger vehicles.
Colourwise, there's a lot of (unwritten) theory about harmony which seems to get forgotten in recent years. Study of enough original old vehicles & trade journals shows patterns falling in to place.
Anyhow there's a book to be filled with this kind of stuff, and a heap of beaut scroll designs around that no one has yet digitised!
The beauty of some of the really nice scrolls (including what a lot of Mike Jackson's Golden Era stuff is based upon) is that when properly done, they can be executed in all their leafy glory with a very minimum of brushstrokes, and without much difficulty.
-------------------- "Stewey" on chat
"...there are no limits when you aim for perfection..." Jonathan Livingston Seagull Posts: 7014 | From: Highgrove via Toowoomba, Queensland, Australia | Registered: Dec 2002
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It IS a good book, please remember me in your will, Dave, before your next posting to Timor, Bali or Iraq (mine is a photocopy & is missing a few words against the spine of a heap of pages, so I'll look forward to transcribing from yours one day when you're up this way, if that's OK, Dave.)
(PS Have you been in touch with Sarge about the Letterheads Oz glass panels yet?)
-------------------- "Stewey" on chat
"...there are no limits when you aim for perfection..." Jonathan Livingston Seagull Posts: 7014 | From: Highgrove via Toowoomba, Queensland, Australia | Registered: Dec 2002
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That's pretty impressive Dave. I'm right behind Ian...not envious exactly, just wonderin what it looks like, etc. It WOULD be interesting to duplicate some of those designs in leaf and colors. Maybe some of us should do that as a project.....??
Ian... I did some work on an old Studebaker farm wagon, and I was expecting to do gold and subtle colors, but the original shocked me...it was red, yellow, and green...all very bright shades. I would have never thought they would be so colorful back in the 1800's, but apparently at least SOME of them were...
-------------------- Jeff Ogden 8727 NE 68 Terr. Gainesville FL, 32609 Posts: 2138 | From: 8827 NE 68 Terr Gainesville Fl 32609 | Registered: Aug 2002
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Ohh I just love this stuff!... The gentleman who co-founded the American Carriage Society was H. Ken Sowles, Falmouth, Maine. He had over 400 sleighs, wagons & carriages along with 60 to 80 Bentley and Rolls Autos. Dispite his wealth and good name he was just a regular guy inside and loved all things horse, cart or car. I met him as a resource for an old milk "pung" or sleigh I refurbished for a dairy.
I could go on for hours about this guy but my point is that he spent years studing restorations and taught himself pinstriping... and he was a GREAT striper- I'd put his work next to anyone! He told me that some wagon and carriage art by Yankees was very bright and circus style bling-bling.... that poor quality paints and varnishes dulled fast and gave the more muted colors over time that some folks associate with antique decorations.
I have visited the carriage works in Williamsburg, Va and they had a similar opinion regarding colors... at times quite vibrant.
Like Ian stated I think it is a matter of regional styles and customer requests. I like the more luxurious colors like burgundy with black forest green and gold.
Jeff I'd love to see how that Studebaker came out!
-------------------- "No excuses!.... No regrets!..."
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Another example of how our opinions on colors of the times might be incorrect: These 2 dresses, the first from 1857 and the second from 1885. I always assumed that the colors of those times were subdued. And the theory about cheap paint fading seems to be a valid one.
Many years ago, as a high school project, I restored an antique child's rocking chair. It originally looked to be dark brown. After a thorough cleaning with denatured alcohol, pinstripe type ornamentation all over it emerged from the grime of 100 years. It was similar in color to Fire Red 1-Shot! Love....Jill
Posts: 8834 | From: Butler, PA, USA | Registered: Jan 2001
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We had a cutter that had some beautiful fine florals on the back of the seat; I was told it was the family's Sunday-going-to-church sleigh. I thought it was neat to have flowers on a winter vehicle. The colours appeared subdued, and I wondered if it was because the shellac or varnish protective layer yellowed as it aged. Like an old oil painting. Or maybe the polish used eventually obscured them. They were probably originally Hot Pink or something.
I think as well you could have monograms done in gold on your carriage. And you could order harness fittings in brass to match: I collect bridle rosettes and have one such, it's so neat! Rosettes go at the junction of the browband and the crown (strap) which goes behind the horse's ears. Many rosettes have a floral motif, maybe to match those sleighs!
Wasn't it common practice to also paint scenes on the tailgates of the farm wagons? Is anybody familiar with the subject matter of these? I assumed they were always sort of pastoral. Does anybody know if the pictorials sometimes occur on the sides as well?
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I know that pictorial work in New England was popular on "Mountain Wagons" and stages, usually featuring scenic vistas of the area. Here is one of my favorite sites for wagon art
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(mine is a photocopy & is missing a few words against the spine of a heap of pages, so I'll look forward to transcribing from yours one day when you're up this way, if that's OK, Dave.)
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