Chiswell Deep Profile Sideboards: A Buyer's Guide to the 1969 Range
The long teak sideboards Chiswell built after 1969 are the pieces people search for now. They are also the ones most often mislabelled.
Something changed at Chiswell that year. The furniture of the early sixties was light. Fine legs, slim frames, restraint borrowed from Denmark. Then the Deep Profile range arrived and the lines got heavier.
What it looks like
No handles. The door has a deep lip cut into its top edge, and you open it with your fingers.
The trim is thicker. The cabinet edges are squarer. The whole piece sits lower and reads as more solid than a 1962 Chiswell.
Teak throughout, with a warm honeyed grain that darkens with age and oil.
Why it happened
Taste moved. The sixties ended and the market wanted bolder, blockier, more architectural furniture. Chiswell had the scale and the supplier relationships to turn quickly.
It was a commercial decision, not a design manifesto. That is usually how these shifts work.
What to look for
The long sideboards are the pieces to own. Four cupboards, a bank of drawers, sometimes over two metres. They were expensive new and they are the hardest to find now.
Check the lip. Original Deep Profile trim is crisp. Refinished pieces often have a softened, rounded edge where someone sanded too hard.
Check the interior. Adjustable shelves should still adjust. Drawer runners should still run.
Is it collectable
Yes, and increasingly so. For years the earlier, finer Chiswell was the piece collectors wanted. The Deep Profile range was seen as the beginning of the decline.
That view has shifted. The seventies have come back. The heavier lines suit modern rooms with modern proportions.
Genuine Chiswell is getting harder to find every year. The Deep Profile pieces are still the value buy.
See what we have in the Chiswell collection.