19th c. French Extending Table

It stretched to seat whoever came. Found in Le Perche and dating to the 19th century, the monumental table stands as a heavy, primitive masterpiece, a thick plank top on massive square legs braced low by a stretcher and worn down to a raw, pale wood. At one end a leaf pulls out on a swing leg, opening the table longer whenever more chairs were needed. Le Perche is deep farming country on the edge of Normandy, the home of the great Percheron workhorses, and a table like this was built to match that life, plain and massive and made to extend so one board could feed the family on an ordinary night and the whole crew when the harvest came in. Sylvie would keep it closed for everyday dinners and pull the leaf out when the table fills, exactly the way it was built to be used.

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