Drexel

Drexel Furniture Company was founded in Drexel, North Carolina, in 1903 and grew into one of the largest and most respected American furniture manufacturers of the mid-20th century. While the company produced furniture across the full range of American decorating styles — traditional, colonial revival, and transitional — it is their mid-century modern production of the 1950s and 1960s that has captured the attention of today's collectors and is most consistently represented in Texas estate sales. The most significant Drexel collection from a collector's standpoint is 'Precedent,' designed by Edward Wormley for Drexel beginning in 1947. Wormley (1907–1995) was one of the leading American furniture designers of the mid-century, best known for his long association with Dunbar Furniture, and his Drexel 'Precedent' line brought his design sensibility — a refined modernism that was warmer and more livable than the harder-edged European modernism of the Bauhaus tradition — to a wider American market. Precedent pieces in walnut with clean lined forms and quality joinery are the Drexel pieces most actively sought by MCM collectors. The 'Declaration' bedroom suite (introduced 1953) and the various 'Heritage' and 'Trailway' collections represent the broader Drexel mid-century production that filled quality American homes in the postwar decades. These pieces — walnut or mahogany bedroom suites, credenzas, dining tables, and occasional chairs — are well-made, well-proportioned, and represent the mainstream American interpretation of Mid-Century Modern. In Texas estates, Drexel appears most often as complete bedroom suites, dining room sets, and living room credenzas and accent pieces from the 1950s–1970s. Drexel merged with Heritage Furniture in 1968 to become Drexel Heritage, which continued producing quality furniture until the brand was eventually discontinued. 'Drexel Heritage' pieces from the 1970s–1990s are generally of lower collector interest than the earlier Drexel production.