How to Identify Mid-Century Furniture Labels and Maker Marks

To identify a label or maker's mark, record it exactly, decide what kind of mark it is, and then check it against an independent record: a museum catalogue entry, a period catalogue, a trade mark or patent register. The second step is the one people skip, and it is where most misidentifications start.

A mark on a piece of furniture only ever answers one question. A manufacturer's label says who made it. A retailer's label says who sold it. A scheme mark says it met a standard. A country-of-origin stamp says where it was made, for customs. A patent or registered design number says when a design was protected. None of them, on its own, says who designed the piece, and most of them give you the earliest possible date rather than the actual one.

This guide sets out a method rather than a picture gallery of logos. Logo galleries go out of date, are rarely sourced, and encourage matching by eye, which is how a later label gets read as an earlier one. The method works on any maker, in any country.

Step one: record before you search

Search engines reward a guess, so make the record first. Everything you write down while you have the piece in front of you is evidence; everything you remember afterwards is not.

Look everywhere. Underside of the seat, inner faces of the rails, back panels, the underside of a table top, inside and underneath every drawer, the backs of doors, and the ends of legs. Marks were placed where they would not be seen in use.
Photograph in raking light. A torch held low across the surface will bring up a faint brand or a stamp that is invisible head-on.
Transcribe exactly. Copy spelling, capitals, line breaks and any numbers as they appear, including the ones you cannot read. Do not correct or complete them.
Note the method. Paper label, foil sticker, cast or pressed metal plate, ink stamp, branded into the wood, moulded into the material, or written in pencil or chalk.
Note the component. A label on a drawer evidences the drawer. A label on a seat evidences the seat. Parts were swapped, repaired and replaced.

The object research checklist on this site is built for exactly this stage and produces a printable summary you can keep with your photographs.

Step two: work out what kind of mark it is

Most of the practical errors with furniture marks come from treating one kind of mark as another. These are the categories worth separating.

Kind of mark	What it can tell you	What it cannot tell you	Where to check it
Manufacturer's label, stamp or brand	Which firm or workshop made the piece (or that component)	Who designed it; the exact year	Museum records of the same maker; period catalogues; trade mark registers
Retailer or importer label	Who sold or imported it, and sometimes where	Who made it	Shop catalogues and advertisements; museum records naming the retailer
Scheme or certification mark	That it met a scheme's standard; usually an earliest date	Maker, designer, timber	The scheme's own rules or registration
Country-of-origin stamp	Country of manufacture, as declared for import	Maker, quality, date	Import rules of the destination country
Patent or registered design number	That a design was protected; an earliest date	When this example was made	Patent office databases and year tables
Regulatory or safety label	That a law applied when it was made or reupholstered	Original date of the frame	The legislation itself
Model, order or workshop numbers; pencil marks	Sometimes a model number from a catalogue; sometimes nothing	Usually nothing without the maker's records	Period catalogues and price lists

A single piece can carry several of these at once, and they should be read separately. They are different witnesses answering different questions.

What museum records show

Museum catalogue entries are the best models for how to describe a mark, because they transcribe what is there and say where it is. Four records illustrate the categories above.

A Utility chair with two marks. The Museum of the Home holds a Lloyd Loom woven fibre armchair, museum number 41/1979, made by W. Lusty & Sons of Bromley-by-Bow, London, and described as Utility Scheme Model No. 3. The record notes that it is "stamped 'CC41' and manufacturer's paper label on the inside of front horizontal rail". The CC41 stamp is the scheme mark: the museum's caption explains that it proved the chair conformed to the government Utility scheme and that the buyer did not pay tax on it. The paper label is the maker's. One answers "what standard", the other "who made it".

A maker's label and a customs stamp. An armchair designed by Jacob Kjær in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, object number 61.7.42, carries an adhesive label under the seat reading "JK [stylized monogram] / JACOB KJÆR / MØBELHAANDVÆRK / KØBENHAVN UDFØRT / DANMARK 1962", and a separate stamp reading "MADE IN DENMARK". The museum names Christiansen & Larsen A/S as manufacturer and dates the chair to 1959. The credit line records a purchase in 1961. The record does not reconcile the 1962 on the label with a 1961 purchase, and neither can we. It is a useful reminder that a transcription is evidence of what someone read, and that dates on labels need checking against everything else.

A cast medallion. A chair designed by A. Hovmand-Olsen in the National Gallery of Victoria, accession number 1999.266, designed in 1959 and made by A/S Mogens Kold, has a "cast in brass and black enamel medallion under seat" reading "CRAFTSMANSHIP / H / - / K / MADE IN DENMARK". The record transcribes the letters without interpreting them, which is the right discipline when the meaning is not documented.

No mark at all. A teak-veneered storage seat at the Museum of the Home, museum number 5/1998, was bought from Heal's in London in 1956 and came to the museum from the son of the original owners. The museum lists Finmar Ltd as importer and Heal's as retailer, and says the seat was "possibly" made in Denmark. No maker is named. That is an honest record: good provenance establishes who sold the piece and when, and still leaves the maker unknown.

Marks that give a date floor

Most dating evidence on furniture sets an earliest possible date rather than a date. That is still valuable. It rules out the misdated listing, which is common.

Scheme marks. The British Utility furniture scheme is the clearest case. Amgueddfa Cymru – Museum Wales dates the first Utility furniture catalogue to 1943 and the end of the scheme to 1952; the Museum of the Home's caption gives the CC41 mark's use as 1942 to 1953. A CC41 stamp puts a piece within that window. The Danish Furnituremakers' Control mark works the same way in the other direction: it cannot appear on furniture made before 1960, as set out in our article on what the Danish control stamp certifies.

American patent numbers. United States patents are numbered in sequence, and the Patent and Trademark Office publishes the first number issued in each year. A piece cannot have been made under a patent before the patent was granted, although "patent pending" and old numbers kept on labels for years mean the number dates the design protection, not the object.

Year	First utility patent issued	First design patent issued
1950	2,492,944	D156,686
1955	2,698,434	D173,777
1960	2,919,443	D186,973
1965	3,163,865	D199,955
1970	3,487,470	D216,419
1975	3,858,241	D234,033

Herman Miller used grids of these numbers on its labels, and the way they changed can narrow a piece to a span of months. The method is set out in how to date Herman Miller furniture by its label.

British registered design numbers. Marks reading "Rd No" followed by a number refer to the British register of designs, numbered from 1 in 1884. The number gives the year a design was registered and so an earliest date. Published year tables for the twentieth century are reconstructions from the registers held at The National Archives and elsewhere, and they differ slightly from one another, so treat a year read from them as approximate and check the register entry itself if the date matters.

Fire safety labels on upholstery. In the United Kingdom, the Furniture and Furnishings (Fire) (Safety) Regulations 1988 require a permanent label on new upholstered furniture. The regulations came into force in stages from 1 November 1988 and do not apply to furniture made before 1 January 1950. A permanent fire label on a mid-century sofa therefore tells you that the upholstery, or the piece, was made or redone after the rules began. It says nothing about the age of the frame underneath.

The common misreadings

Reading the design date as the object's date. Successful designs stayed in production for decades. A label from a firm that made a 1949 design in 1965 dates the chair to 1965. Listings that give the design year as the age of the piece are a frequent error.

Reading the retailer as the maker. Department stores and importers labelled what they sold. In Britain, names such as Heal's and Finmar appear on furniture they retailed or imported but did not make. The Victoria and Albert Museum's record for a 1949–50 Utility cupboard, museum number W.28-1980, is careful to record Heal & Son Ltd in its role as retailer.

Reading a scheme mark as an attribution. CC41, the Danish control mark and similar marks were applied across many members' ordinary production. They identify a standard, not a designer.

Reading the absence of a mark as a negative. Paper and foil labels fall off. Stamps are sanded away in refinishing. Furniture sold on the home market often had no reason to carry export marks. No mark removes one line of evidence; it does not count against the piece.

Trusting a label on its own. Labels can be transferred from a damaged piece to a better one, and labels can be reproduced. A label that is clean, unworn and firmly stuck to a surface that is otherwise worn and dirty deserves a second look. Check that the construction, timber and fittings agree with what the label claims.

A working order for any mark

Photograph and transcribe it exactly, with its position and the component it is on.
Decide what kind of mark it is, using the table above.
Ask only the question that kind of mark can answer.
Find an independent record of the same mark: a museum catalogue entry, a period catalogue or advertisement, or a register.
Check that construction and materials agree with it.
Write down the date as a range, and say "unknown" where the evidence stops.

Where to verify a mark

Museum collection databases. The Victoria and Albert Museum, the Museum of the Home, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art and the National Gallery of Victoria all publish furniture records online, and many transcribe marks and labels. Search by maker, then compare wording, form and position, not just the logo.

Trade mark and patent registers. The United States Patent and Trademark Office's status records give registration and first-use dates for marks, which is how the dates for the Danish control mark can be checked. Patent numbers can be looked up directly to see what was protected and when.

Period catalogues and trade literature. Model numbers on a label only become useful when matched to a catalogue or price list. Our guide to collecting and buying will add a dedicated article on using catalogues; meanwhile the essential guide, what is mid-century modern design, sets the wider chronology.

Designer research. If a mark leads you to a maker, the designer is a separate question. For Danish furniture, our introduction to lesser-known Danish furniture designers shows the kind of museum and reference sources that support a name.

Common questions

Does a maker's label prove who designed my furniture?

No. A manufacturer's label identifies the firm or workshop that made the piece, or the component the label is on. Attribution to a designer needs separate evidence, such as a period catalogue that illustrates the model with the designer's name, or a museum record of the same design.

My piece has no label. Is it worth less or is it fake?

Not necessarily either. Paper and foil labels detach, stamps are lost in refinishing, and many makers did not mark everything. The absence of a mark removes one piece of evidence; judge construction, materials and provenance instead.

Can a label tell me the exact year my furniture was made?

Occasionally, but usually it gives a range or an earliest date. Scheme marks, patent numbers and registered design numbers all set a floor. Sequences of manufacturer labels, where they are well documented, can narrow the range to a few years.

What does a CC41 mark on British furniture mean?

It shows that the piece was made under the government Utility furniture scheme. Amgueddfa Cymru – Museum Wales dates the first Utility catalogue to 1943 and the end of the scheme to 1952, and the Museum of the Home gives the mark's use as 1942 to 1953. The mark identifies the scheme, not the maker, who may be named on a separate label.

Why does my vintage sofa have a modern fire safety label?

In the United Kingdom, the Furniture and Furnishings (Fire) (Safety) Regulations 1988 require permanent labels on new upholstered furniture. A label of that kind on a mid-century piece shows the upholstery was redone, or the piece made, after the rules came in; it does not date the frame.