A coffee table is a low table designed to be placed in a sitting area for convenient support of beverages,

remote control In electronics, a remote control (also known as a remote or clicker) is an electronic device used to operate another device from a distance, usually wirelessly. In consumer electronics, a remote control can be used to operate devices such ...

magazine A magazine is a periodical publication, generally published on a regular schedule (often weekly or monthly), containing a variety of content. They are generally financed by advertising, purchase price, prepaid subscriptions, or by a combinatio ...

book A book is a medium for recording information in the form of writing or images, typically composed of many pages (made of papyrus, parchment, vellum, or paper) bound together and protected by a cover. The technical term for this physical ...

s (especially large, illustrated coffee table books), decorative objects, and other small items.R.W. Symonds & B.B. Whineray, ''Victorian Furniture'', Pub: Country Life Ltd. Most coffee tables are made of wood (though faux wood tables are increasingly common) or glass and metal, typically,

stainless steel Stainless steel is an alloy of iron that is resistant to rusting and corrosion. It contains at least 11% chromium and may contain elements such as carbon, other nonmetals and metals to obtain other desired properties. Stainless steel's r ...

aluminum Aluminium (aluminum in American and Canadian English) is a chemical element with the symbol Al and atomic number 13. Aluminium has a density lower than those of other common metals, at approximately one third that of steel. It ha ...

and may incorporate cabinets or drawers. Coffee tables were thought to initially be constructed in Renaissance England.

Origins

In Europe, the first tables specifically designed as and called coffee tables, appear to have been made in Britain during the late

Victorian era In the history of the United Kingdom and the British Empire, the Victorian era was the period of Queen Victoria's reign, from 20 June 1837 until her death on 22 January 1901. The era followed the Georgian period and preceded the Edwa ...

According to the listing in ''Victorian Furniture'' by

R. W. Symonds Robert Wemyss Symonds FRIBA (31 December 1889 – 5 September 1958) was a British architect, and "the pre-eminent 20th century scholar and authority on English furniture".E. W. Godwin Edward William Godwin (26 May 1833, Bristol – 6 October 1886, London) was a progressive English architect-designer, who began his career working in the strongly polychromatic "Ruskinian Gothic" style of mid-Victorian Britain, inspired by ' ...

in 1868 and made in large numbers by William Watt, and Collinson and Lock, is a coffee table. If this is correct it may be one of the earliest made in Europe. Other sources, however, list it only as "table" so this can not be stated categorically. Far from being a low table, this table was about twenty-seven inches high. Later coffee tables were designed as low tables and this idea may have come from the

Ottoman Empire The Ottoman Empire, * ; is an archaic version. The definite article forms and were synonymous * and el, Оθωμανική Αυτοκρατορία, Othōmanikē Avtokratoria, label=none * info page on book at Martin Luther University ...

, based on the tables in use in tea gardens. However, as the Anglo-Japanese style was popular in Britain throughout the 1870s and 1880s and low tables were common in

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the n ...

, this seems to be an equally likely source for the concept of a long low table. From the late 19th century onwards, many coffee tables were subsequently made in earlier styles due to the popularity of revivalism, so it is quite possible to find

Louis XVI Louis XVI (''Louis-Auguste''; ; 23 August 175421 January 1793) was the last King of France before the fall of the monarchy during the French Revolution. He was referred to as ''Citizen Louis Capet'' during the four months just before he was ...

''style'' coffee tables or Georgian ''style'' coffee tables, but there seems to be no evidence of a table actually made as a coffee table before this time. Joseph Aronson writing in 1938 defines a coffee table as a, "Low wide table now used before a sofa or couch. There is no historical precedent...," suggesting that coffee tables were a late development in the history of furniture. With the increasing availability of television sets from the 1950s onwards coffee tables really came into their own since they are low enough, even with cups and glasses on them, not to obstruct the view of the TV.

References

{{reflist Tables (furniture)

Origins

See also

References