Found in Villeneuve-lès-Avignon and originally from a farm near Maussane-les-Alpilles, this 19th-century French bench is a long primitive piece built for a Provençal farmhouse. The top is a single long plank, and the four splayed legs are pinned with hand-cut joinery that has held for over a hundred and fifty years. A bench like this lived in the kitchen pulled up to the long farm table, then moved outside in summer to the table set under the olive trees for the midday meal. The wood has weathered to a deep grey-brown from a hundred and fifty years of use and the slow heat of Provençal summers. Sylvie places it against a wall in a long dining room, ready to slide out for the dinner that turns into eight people instead of four.
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