Commode painted oak, walnut or fruitwoods, with carved decoration, typical of French provincial furniture. In the English-speaking world, "commode" passed into cabinet-makers' parlance in London by the mid-eighteenth century to describe chests of drawers with gracefully curved fronts, and sometimes with shaped sides as well, perceived as being in the "French" taste. Thomas Chippendale employed the term "French Commode Tables" to describe designs in "The Cabinet-Maker and Upholsterer's Director" (1753), and Ince and Mayhew illustrated a "Commode Chest of drawers", plate xliii, in their "Universal System of Household Furniture", 1759–62. John Gloag notes that "Commode" expanded to describe any piece of
Ébéniste the industry. From the mid-17th century through the 18th, a notable number of ébénistes of German and Low Countries extraction were pre-eminent among Parisian furniture-makers, as the abbreviated list below suggests. Ébéniste Ébéniste () is the French word for a cabinet-maker. As opposed to "ébéniste", ""menuisier"" denotes a woodcarver or chairmaker in French. The English equivalent for "ébéniste", "ebonist", is not commonly used. Originally, an "ébéniste" was one who worked with ebony, a favoured luxury wood for mid-seventeenth century Parisian cabinets, originating in imitation of elite furniture being made in Antwerp. The word is 17th century in origin. Early Parisian