August 2026
Understanding marquetry: reading a wooden decor
Quartered veneers, end grain, stringing and scorched shading: what a well-executed veneer tells you.
Marquetry means composing a decor from thin sheets of different woods, sometimes with brass, tortoiseshell or mother-of-pearl. On an antique the veneer thickness is uneven: it was hand-sawn, not machine-peeled.
Dark shading is not painted. It was obtained by dipping the edge of the sheet into hot sand, producing a gradient that cannot be reproduced uniformly. Look at the petals of a flower: the shadow should feel alive, never regular.
The stringing framing the panels gives another clue. On a period piece it follows the slight irregularities of the carcass; on a reproduction it is perfectly straight.