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Plaster Ornamentation and its Effect on the Design of Early American Colonial FurnitureHistory of Early American Colonial Furniture

Plaster Ceiling and Frieze, Early English Renaissance

Plastering may claim to be the most ancient form of decoration, for the discoveries at Tel-el-Amarna reveal the art to have existed more than 1,000 years before even the well-known examples at Pompeii were produced. The trade of the, plasterer is closely allied to that of the artist painter, fresco being a method of painting with water colours on freshly laid plaster, the colours incorporating and drying with it, which is the only means of obtaining durability. The art of fresco was revived by the great painters of the Renaissance, who worked exactly in this manner: compare the Sistine Chapel in the Vatican thus decorated by Michael Angelo.

Plaster has been known under numerous names, and many varieties have existed, differing according to the plastic mixtures. The different compositions and the methods of application are described in considerable detail by Vitruvius. The superior quality of the Italian plaster was certainly due to considerable quantities of very finely ground marble being introduced into the finishing coat, which enabled the work to be so highly polished that it was used as mirrors and tops of tables.

Numerous experiments for improving the quality of plaster are recorded: Pliny mentions fig juice; the Egyptians mixed mud from the Nile; elm bark was employed for Justinian's Church at Constantinople; bullock's blood was another ingredient. Such materials as beer, eggs, milk, gluten, sugar, pitch, and wax were used for mixing with mortar by builders of medieval cathedrals; indeed, beer was habitually employed, Bess of Hardwick's masons “having to melt it in the cold winter of her death."

Horsehair and fibre were in use in the sixteenth century. The account for repairs of the steeple of Newark Church in 1671 contains an entry: " Six strike of malt to make mortar to blend with ye lime and temper the same and 350 eggs to mix with it." The exterior of Lord Burlington's Palladian villa at Chiswick was plastered with stucco, and during its building the surrounding district was impoverished for eggs and buttermilk. Sir Christopher Wren preferred the old method of using" marble meal," that is, marble very finely ground.

The objects of these various ingredients were either to retard the setting, to allow more time for manipulation, or to increase the ultimate hardness.

The earliest examples in England seem to have been executed by the ceiling shown on. page 118, which dates from about 1730, was doubtless intended to represent the style of the greatest architect this country has produced.

Plaster Ceiling and Frieze, Early English Renaissance

Plaster Ceiling and Frieze, Early English Renaissance

Plaster Ceiling and Frieze, Early English Renaissance

Plaster Ceiling, Period of Wren