The Vintage Wood Furniture You Can Thrift That Could Be Quite Valuable (If You're Lucky)

A staple in interior design for millennia, wooden furniture is the warm trend that will never go out of style. Nevertheless, over its impressive, lengthy history, there have been certain designs and techniques that have marked and influenced this furniture's evolution forever. Bentwood is most definitely one of them, and if you find some of these pieces at the thrift store, they could be quite valuable. First developed and patented by German craftsman Michael Thonet in Austria in the 19th century, bentwood is solid wood furniture masterfully bent with the help of steam and metal strips and clamps, creating beautiful curved lines without the financial and temporal strains of carving. It was an undeniable breakthrough and massive success, with its most iconic model, the No. 14 Chair, registering a whopping 50 million sales by 1930. If you've ever been to a typical European café, chances are you've sat on one of them. 

Still incredibly elegant, durable, and surprisingly comfortable today, bentwood is the kind of furniture you should always check out at estate sales, auctions, and antique stores. But not all of it will be worth the same. Bentwood's border-crossing popularity meant that soon enough the market was flooded with copycats, especially after Thonet's patent rant out in 1880. While all bentwood is beautiful on account of its artful, sinuous shapes, Thonet, more specifically Gebrüder Thonet, furniture is the original, and the one you should be looking out for. Thankfully, Michael and his five sons, carefully marked and catalogued the company's many designs.

Although the chairs are the crown jewel of bentwood furniture, this technique was applied to all kinds of purposes, from coat stands and tables to rocking chairs and cribs. As mentioned, Thonet is a designer name you should know when buying this antique furniture, but other Austrian manufacturers may pop up associated with bentwood, such as Mundus and J. & J. Kohn. Both of these companies produced and sold bentwood shortly after Thonet's success, though they were quickly assimilated by the latter, with successive mergers resulting in a bona fide monopoly over this style of furniture. Still, even while under Gebrüder Thonet ownership, Mundus and J. & J. Kohn continued to release pieces with their respective brand names and markings. 

As with most antiques, the older and rarer the pieces, the more valuable they will be, just as long as they have been preserved. Similarly, both the passage of time and restoration efforts may affect the legibility of markings such as stamps and paper labels. When it comes to Thonet, you can contact the company's current offices to authenticate older furniture. On eBay, for example, there are some stunning examples of bentwood. A pair of the famous café chairs sells for a little over $300, two striking round stools are worth $250, a swirly rocking chair can be scored for as little as $65, while a rare baby high chair in great condition goes for $575.