Show me:
and
Clear all filters

  • 33 items
  • 25 items Explore
  • 89 items
  • 3,540 items Explore
  • 97 items Explore
  • 14 items
  • 4 items
  • 220 items
  • 13,858 items Explore
  • 211 items Explore
  • 1,225 items Explore
  • 8,754 items Explore
  • 5,063 items Explore
  • 62 items Explore
  • 165 items Explore
  • 13,071 items Explore
  • 13,620 items Explore
  • 4,802 items Explore
  • 1 items
  • 5 items
  • 149 items Explore
  • 2,002 items Explore
  • 4,755 items Explore
  • 438 items Explore
  • 266 items
  • 104 items Explore
  • 19,975 items Explore
  • 36 items Explore
  • 1,912 items Explore
  • 1,083 items Explore
  • 5 items
  • 2,166 items Explore
  • 455 items Explore
  • 920 items Explore
  • 1 items Explore
  • 5 items
  • 7 items
  • 20,385 items Explore
  • 800 items Explore
  • 19 items
  • 73 items Explore
  • 33 items
  • 792 items
  • 20 items
  • 4 items
  • 26 items
  • 61 items
  • 28 items
  • 319 items Explore
  • 6 items
  • 44 items Explore
  • 1 items
  • 2 items
  • 2 items
  • 9 items
  • 122 items Explore
  • 119 items
  • 1 items
  • 926 items Explore
  • 724 items
  • 95 items
  • 27 items
  • 38,047 items Explore
  • 1 items
  • 3,880 items Explore
  • 1,533 items Explore
  • 403 items
  • 125 items Explore
  • 10,750 items Explore
  • 9,682 items Explore
  • 4 items
  • 1 items
  • 38 items
  • 3 items
  • 4 items
  • 6,781 items Explore
  • 2 items
  • 7,364 items Explore
  • 4,922 items Explore
  • 2,005 items Explore
  • 1,195 items Explore
  • 23,816 items Explore
  • 3,660 items Explore
  • 17 items
  • 5 items
  • 334 items
  • 106 items
  • 1 items
  • 3,330 items Explore
  • 23 items Explore
  • 374 items Explore
  • 796 items Explore
  • 1,087 items Explore
  • 514 items Explore
  • 1,519 items Explore
  • 89 items
  • 125 items Explore
  • 6,954 items Explore
  • 76 items
  • 108 items
  • 4 items
  • 2 items
  • 63 items
  • 2 items
  • 2,932 items Explore
  • 1,529 items Explore
  • 203 items
  • 90 items
  • 22,303 items Explore
  • 1,340 items Explore
  • 138 items
  • 848 items Explore
  • 32 items
  • 1 items
  • 122 items Explore
  • 40 items
  • 20 items
  • 252 items
  • 313 items
  • 687 items Explore
  • 343 items Explore
  • 2,429 items
  • 2,535 items
  • 3 items
  • 1 items
  • 4,394 items Explore
  • 40,356 items Explore
  • 1 items
  • 3,293 items Explore
  • 275 items Explore
  • 8,876 items Explore
  • 31 items
  • 25 items
  • 304 items Explore
  • 776 items Explore
  • 3 items
  • 65 items
  • 161 items
  • 50 items
  • 52 items
  • 23,967 items Explore
  • 916 items
  • 66 items
  • 22,648 items Explore
  • 2 items
  • 2,336 items Explore
  • 1 items
  • 1,028 items Explore
  • 4 items
  • 759 items
  • 499 items
  • 4 items
  • 3,309 items Explore
  • 179 items
  • 59 items
  • 455 items Explore
  • 3 items
  • 21 items
  • 90 items Explore
  • 76 items
  • 281 items Explore
  • 1 items
  • 6 items
  • 128 items
  • 295 items
  • 447 items
  • 287 items
  • 1 items
  • 906 items Explore
  • 276 items Explore
  • 481 items
  • 11,295 items Explore
  • 755 items Explore
  • 6,020 items Explore
  • 8,302 items Explore
  • 27 items
  • 1 items
  • 5,971 items Explore
  • 4 items
  • 3,725 items Explore
  • 9,182 items Explore
  • 7,886 items Explore
  • 182 items
  • 19 items
  • 144 items
  • 7 items
  • 853 items Explore
  • 19 items
  • 8 items
  • 1,096 items Explore
  • 270 items
  • 1 items
  • 2,122 items
  • 1 items
  • 3,543 items Explore
  • 695 items Explore
  • 18 items
  • 134 items
  • 6,738 items Explore
  • 95 items
  • 18,934 items Explore
  • 3,137 items Explore
  • 3 items
  • 7 items
  • 10,979 items Explore
  • 37 items
  • 2 items
  • 21,448 items Explore
  • 35 items
  • 13,321 items Explore
  • 3,460 items Explore
  • 5,645 items Explore
  • 33 items
  • 51,852 items Explore
  • 41 items
  • 646 items Explore
  • 417 items
  • 26,949 items Explore
  • 216 items
  • 3 items
  • 1 items
  • 35 items
  • 27 items
  • 445 items Explore
  • 636 items
  • 217 items Explore
  • 13 items
  • 13,766 items Explore
  • 1,360 items Explore
  • 3 items
  • 10,260 items
  • 9 items
  • 10 items
  • 14 items
  • 25 items
  • 1 items
  • 4,537 items Explore
  • 913 items Explore
  • 1 items
  • 1 items
  • 318 items
  • 509 items Explore
  • 42 items
  • 2,289 items Explore
  • 1,664 items Explore
  • 15 items
  • 1,877 items Explore
  • 150 items
  • 80 items
  • 766 items Explore
  • 3,102 items Explore
  • 44 items
  • 17 items
  • 12 items
  • 10,670 items Explore
  • 23,753 items Explore
  • 1 items
  • 3 items
  • 1 items
  • 41 items
  • 1,374 items
  • 177 items Explore
  • 8 items
  • 92 items
  • 1 items
  • 13,586 items Explore
  • 3,612 items Explore
  • 2,904 items Explore
  • 4,534 items Explore
  • 22 items
  • 30 items
  • 6,911 items Explore
  • 4,842 items Explore
  • 2,300 items Explore
  • 2,818 items Explore
  • 2 items
  • 1,899 items Explore
  • 191 items
  • 223 items Explore
  • 421 items Explore
  • 6,110 items Explore
  • 8,729 items Explore
  • 1,833 items Explore
  • 3 items
  • 1 items
  • 5,922 items Explore
  • 3,354 items Explore
  • 11,134 items Explore
  • 1 items
  • 84 items
  • 11 items
  • 2,516 items Explore
  • 7 items
  • 24 items
  • 51 items
  • 6 items
  • 1 items
  • 4,291 items Explore
  • 611 items Explore
  • 75 items
  • 17 items
  • 155 items Explore
  • 1 items
  • 95 items Explore
  • 458 items
  • 996 items Explore
  • 3,614 items Explore
  • 4 items
  • 5 items
  • 2 items
  • 9,671 items Explore
  • 48 items Explore
  • 3 items
  • 7 items
  • 42 items
  • 3 items
  • 13,807 items Explore
  • 4 items
  • 1,170 items Explore
  • 92 items
  • 10,565 items Explore
  • 1,920 items
  • 18 items
  • 6,727 items Explore
  • 21 items
  • 12,949 items Explore
  • 1,418 items Explore
  • 8 items
  • 6,176 items Explore
  • 14,885 items Explore
  • 4 items
  • 1,667 items Explore
  • 181 items Explore
  • 4 items
  • 16 items
  • 5,684 items Explore
  • 12,284 items Explore
  • 48 items
  • 25 items
  • 2 items
  • 3 items
  • 7,191 items Explore
  • 357 items Explore
  • 13 items
  • 6 items
  • 103 items Explore
  • 7 items
  • 5 items
  • 485 items
  • 688 items Explore
  • 8,391 items Explore
  • 58 items
  • 1 items
  • 7,347 items Explore
  • 5 items
  • 26 items
  • 4,741 items Explore
  • 428 items
  • 339 items Explore
  • 12,715 items Explore
  • 55 items
  • 20 items
  • 7 items
  • 4 items
  • 325 items Explore
  • 427 items
  • 458 items
  • 1 items
  • 3,694 items Explore
  • 27 items
  • 1,238 items Explore
  • 2,503 items Explore
  • 1,123 items Explore
  • 36 items
  • 1,139 items Explore
  • 97 items Explore
  • 24 items
  • 229 items Explore
  • 80,412 items Explore
  • 1 items
  • 3,139 items Explore
  • 2,871 items Explore
  • 24 items
  • 5,352 items Explore
  • 1,831 items Explore
  • 4 items
  • 17,516 items Explore
  • 4,931 items Explore
  • 1 items
  • 7 items
  • 631 items Explore
  • 85 items
  • 31 items
  • 1 items
  • 76 items
  • 29 items
  • 86 items
  • 3 items
  • 1,176 items Explore
  • 109 items
  • 805 items
  • 13,209 items Explore
  • 27 items
  • 13 items
  • 1,710 items Explore
  • 217 items
  • 17,042 items Explore
  • 85 items
  • 17 items
  • 1 items
  • 8 items
  • 324 items
  • 2 items
  • 631 items Explore
  • 1,592 items Explore
  • 8 items
  • 1,130 items Explore
  • 389 items
  • 1 items
  • 2 items
  • 354 items

Select a time period

Or choose a specific year

Clear all filters

The Knole Sofa

Unknown

Category

Furniture

Date

circa 1635 - 1640

Materials

Beech covered with silk velvet and passementerie (braid and fringing), iron

Measurements

104 x 172.5 x 56 cm

Place of origin

London

Order this image

Collection

Knole, Kent

NT 129442

Caption

Today a sofa often feels like an essential part of the home, helping us to relax or socialise in comfort. Amazingly, the word (written as ‘saffaw’) was first used in the 1600s, and the object shown here is one of the earliest surviving examples of an upholstered couch. The design was influenced by furniture from Italy and France, and was originally made for use in Stuart royal palaces. It was covered in crimson velvet and was part of a grand suite of furniture that included two other sofas, six chairs and eight stools. It was probably moved from one of the royal palaces (Hampton Court is stamped under the seat of a comparable chair) to the house of Charles Sackville, 6th Earl of Dorset (1643–1706), at Knole in Kent in the 1690s. The design later became a classic and was regularly copied and reinterpreted, particularly from the Victorian period onwards.

Summary

A state couch, of beech covered in silk velvet, made by unknown upholsterers in London, probably suppliers to the Great Wardrobe, circa 1635-40. With a rectangular, slightly raked back on rectangular-section rear supports and between straight rectangular profile arms, each topped by a padded and cushioned ‘wing’ or ‘rest’ which can be inclined or raised on an iron ratchet mechanism. The arms raised on columnar front supports descending to rectangular-section front stiles or legs. The seat padded and rectangular. Covered throughout in crimson silk velvet stamped with a repeating small pattern, fixed with brass dome-headed studs and hung with runs of open-work woven lace and gold and silver thread caul fringe. The rear of the back covered in red wool.

Full description

This unique piece of state furniture survives with its seventeenth-century upholstery, top covers, finials and decorative nailing, albeit with later restorations. Knole contains almost all the upholstered furniture surviving from the seventeenth-century royal palaces. Otherwise, it can only be seen in portraiture. Its presence at Knole is largely due to Charles Sackville, 6th Earl of Dorset (1638-1706), who held the post of Lord Chamberlain (1689-95). He could keep or sell royal furniture which he deemed in need of replacement, acquiring it as a perquisite or ‘perk’ of office. The Knole Sofa, more properly a state couch – the word ‘saffaw’ was first coined around 1700 – is arguably the National Trust’s most famous single piece of furniture. Its distinctive form has been extensively copied since the nineteenth century. In 1945, the furniture historian R. W. Symonds noted the ‘The famous Knole Couch...has been reproduced in tens of thousands by nearly every furniture manufacturer from Victorian to modern times’ (Symonds 1945, p. 114). Eddy Sackville-West, 5th Lord Sackville (1901-65), was apparently once asked how he could live ‘in that dark old place in Kent with all those old sofas?’ To which he replied: ‘One sofa!’ The couch is part of a larger set of matching crimson velvet seat furniture, now in the so-called Leicester Gallery at Knole. It comprises two further couches (NT 129438.1-129438.2), six chairs (NT 129439.1-129439.6), and eight stools – four high (NT 129441.1-129441.4) and four low (NT 129440.1-129440.4). It is thought that this set would have been arranged symmetrically, probably under a state canopy or canopies. The design of the Knole Sofa derives from Italy and France – indeed R. W. Symonds described the design of the Knole Sofa as ‘undoubtedly of French origin’ (Symonds 1945, p. 114) – but it was probably made in London, in now unknown workshops which operated as suppliers to the Great Wardrobe.

Provenance

Presumably acquired as a perquisite by Charles Sackville, 6th Earl of Dorset, in his capacity as Lord Chamberlain to King William III. It is thought to belong to a suite of upholstered furniture, the remainders of which were first recorded at Knole in 1706. Knole and the majority of its furniture were accepted by HM Treasury in part payment of death duties and transferred to the National Trust in 1946.

Makers and roles

Unknown, workshop

References

Symonds 1945: R. W. Symonds, 'The Upholstered Furniture at Knole I', Burlington Magazine LXXXVI (May 1945): 110-15 Beard and Coleman 1999: Geoffrey Beard and John Coleman, 'The Knole Settee', Apollo CXLIX / 446 (April 1999): 24-28 Rowell 2006: Christopher Rowell, 'A Set of Early Seventeenth-Century Crimson Velvet Seat Furniture at Knole: New Light on the "Knole Sofa"', Furniture History XLII (2006): 27-52 Porter and Vida, 2019: ‘The Knole Sofa’, in Nathalie Cohen and Frances Parton, eds., Knole Revealed, London 2019, pp. 116-7. Westman, 2019: Annabel Westman, Fringe Frog & Tassel London 2019, pp. 35-6

View more details