"Kaplan Furniture Co., Beacon Hill" Library Cabinet

From the Winterthur Museum Library, Winterthur, DE:

The Kaplan Furniture Company was established in a tiny shop in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 1905 by Isaac Kaplan, who had emigrated from Russia, via England, with his wife and children just the year before.  An announcement of his arrival from the UK appeared in a newspaper in Boston: “Late from London—Wood Turner and Carver—Cabinet-making as fine as can be had in England.”  When Isaac started his company he had only $55 to his name.  Soon after beginning his business, his shop burned; however, a $100 bank loan gave him the capital he needed to reopen.  Legend has it that a Beacon Hill matron came into Isaac’s shop one day and said: “Last night my dinner guests so admired my antique Sheraton chest of drawers that I want you to copy it for my daughter’s wedding gift.  Can you duplicate its design?  Can you reproduce the same gentle contours of the original?”  Isaac did and his primary furniture business of interpreting classic American antique pieces began.  Shortly afterward, Isaac designed a pair of tip tables that marked the beginning of the Beacon Hill Collection, his principal furniture line. Isaac quickly gained a reputation for building quality furniture, much of his work being adaptations of antique pieces.  Later, the company acquired the Old Colony Furniture Company and continued to make pieces under that name as well.  At the 1939 World’s Fair in New York City, the Kaplan company showed an exhibit of three rooms of miniature furniture, designed by Dexter Spaulding.  This exhibit subsequently traveled to other venues.  The company made furniture for W. & J. Sloane and also, under contract, for the United States government.

In the 1920s, Isaac bought the city block on which his first shop was located and then built a much larger factory on the site; it was located at 28 Osborn Street.  After the Kaplan company left Cambridge it was located in Medford, Mass., and after Isaac’s passing other generations of the Kaplan family ran the company.  It closed in 1972.

This outstanding and impressive two-piece mahogany "library cabinet", or breakfront, is from the Kaplan "Beacon Hill" collection and retains it's original paper label with the handwritten piece number "757".  The bottom has ten locking drawers with gently curved fronts in a lighter tone than the frame.  All the locks are in good working order.  Above the drawers are a pair of gold embossed leather slides. The top part of the cabinet has two locking doors with curved glass and Gothic mullions as well as hand carved moulding.  This exceptional piece really has to be seen in person to appreciate its' beauty and the true craftsmanship that went into it's creation.  85" h, 52" l., 20" w.  American, c. 1920's  SOLD