Treasure map of a cabinetmaker's gems

The Seuffert Legacy by Brian Peet. Photo / Glenn Jeffrey

Once, at school in woodworking class, I made a rimu pencil box. Mine was a rather lacklustre imitation of boxes made commercially by Sovereign Woodworkers of Wanganui whose work had the bonus of being inlaid with specimens of figured native timber.

Mine was in a different league to the Sovereign one, but theirs was still not in the ballpark when compared to the work produced by the Seuffert family of Auckland in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Brian Peet, a fourth generation descendant of Anton Seuffert, has spent 15 years researching New Zealand's indisputable masters of marquetry - the art of inlaid timbers - and he has written a wonderful book.

With one of Peet's aims the avoidance of the erroneous attribution of future finds (other cabinetmakers were also producing inlaid furniture at the same time as the Seufferts), he has comprehensively catalogued and illustrated more than 105 pieces of Anton and William Seuffert's work.

In early 1862, the citizens of Auckland province fell behind a decision to thank the "Mother Country" for their "timely aid" by subscribing to raise £300 to purchase and ship to England a desk - an escritoire - by Seuffert to present to Queen Victoria. A newspaper rhapsodically reported then that it was, amongst other things, inlaid with pikiarere (New Zealand clematis) "to which the native women have an almost romantic attachment, an emblem of purity and innocence with which the Maori maiden wreath their hair when they emerge from bathing".

Ironically, the gift was in fact in gratitude for the 10,000 British troops who had been sent to help wage war against those very Maori in the recent Land Wars. Against this background of a young and developing colonial country, the Bohemian cabinetmaker Anton and his son William played out their lives producing consistently high quality work, then recognised as suitable for the Queen of Britain/New Zealand and now recognised as unique and unparalleled.

It appears typical for the 19th century New Zealand press to over-enthuse about specimens of local industry, elevating their status to suitability for, say, a testimonial piece for a departing Bishop Selwyn or the visiting Countess of Aberdeen. She, suffering our colonial affection, was presented with a table made by Seuffert with reportedly "over 40,000 separate pieces of wood". William Seuffert's record of 6340 pieces was obviously more reliable but nonetheless the accounting on either side is interesting.

Peet's inclusion of contemporaneous newspaper reports gives a perspective of the times that gives flesh to the bones or, may I suggest, a solid carcass beneath the veneer, making a very readable and fascinating book. While produced primarily as a record of archival information and of the known achievements of the Seufferts, in drawing upon the guidance and technical expertise of collectors, historians, cabinetmakers and restorers, Peet has elevated a potentially dry catalogue to a level of excellence.