Thomas Shearer in point of time, the first published document to show it. Shearer, like many of his contemporaries, was much given to devising "harlequin" furniture. He was a designer of high merit and real originality, and occupies a distinguished place among the little band of men, often, like himself, ill-educated and obscure of origin, who raised the English cabinet-making of the second half of the 18th century to an illustrious place in artistic history. Thomas Shearer Thomas Shearer was an 18th-century English furniture designer and cabinet-maker. Shearer was a craftsman and the author of most of the plates in "The Cabinet
Campaign furniture a politician. The Army & Navy Stores followed on from a strong British tradition of innovative and practical design in portable furniture that had its roots in the 18th century and grew as the British Empire expanded. Much of the early portable furniture would have been bespoke (made to order). It would not have been uncommon for a soldier to ask his local cabinet maker to take a domestic design and adapt it for travel. As demand grew, a number of well known designers, including Chippendale, Sheraton and Gillows, considered portable furniture and the end of the 18th century saw