Hummerston Brothers

East Parade, Leeds, Yorkshire; upholsterers, painters and decorators, cabinet carvers & gilders and cabinet makers (fl.c.1839-1887)

Hummerston Brothers was established in Leeds about 1839. They were initially painters, decorators and upholsterers, but in 1869 they expanded their business to become cabinet makers specialising in ‘Art Furniture’ for clients in the north of England, including the Earl of Harewood and Mrs Meynell Ingram of Temple Newsam. At the latter house they were responsible for decorating and furnishing several rooms in 1886. 

The firm was recorded in The Furniture Gazette Directory, 1876 & 1877, as cabinet makers & cabinet carvers & gilders and The Furniture Gazette: Classified List of the Furniture, Upholstery and Allied Trades, 1886 as cabinet carvers & gilders at 10 East Parade, Leeds. 

Hummerston Brothers acquired an 200-300 year old oak tree, 8ft 9 inches in length, dug up opposite the Cardian Arms, Burley. The wood was of ebony black and the firm stated that their intention was to season it for 4-5 years and then make it into dining or drawing room furniture [The Furniture Gazette, 7 July 1877].

They won medals at numerous exhibitions and had a reputation for employing only highly skilled craftsmen. The Furniture Gazette recorded several: 

• The Yorkshire Exhibition: displayed specimen rooms (24 May 1879)
• The Yorkshire Fine Art and Industrial Exhibition, York - medal winner (October 1879) 
• The Yorkshire Fine Arts Society show, Leeds: an ebonized Anglo-Japanese drawing room suite (March 1881)
• The Tradesmen’s Exhibition, Leeds (3 September 1881)
• The Industrial & Fine Art Exhibition, Bradford Technical School: a stained oak Jacobean dining room and American ash bedroom suites - two silver medals (1882)
• The Huddersfield Technical School Exhibition; ‘inexpensive’ furniture (1883)
• The National Trade Exhibition, Coloured Cloth Hall, Leeds (January 1885)  

The Furniture Gazette also reported that Hummerston Brothers were the carvers and makers of an oak mantel for the museum section of the new building of the Leeds & Yorkshire Architectural Society, Albion Street, Leeds [8 September 1883]. 

The partnership included John, Henry, William and James Hummerston. It was dissolved in 1887 with John's and Henry's retirement [The Furniture Gazette,1 January 1888]. James continued working as a painter and decorator as 10 East Parade and William carried on the furniture making and upholstery business at 11 East Parade. An Anglo-Japanese cabinet of c.1880 bearing a Hummerston Brothers label is at Temple Newam House, Leeds, together with the original design drawing (illus. Lomax, FHS Newsletter (February 2007), figs 1 & 2). 

Sources: Agius, British Furniture 1880-1915 (1978); Lomax, ‘Two Recent Nineteenth-Century Acquisitions for Temple Newsam’, FHS Newsletter (February 2007).