This is my story- for 15 years I was looking for "My Desk", and I found it for 100 bucks on craigslist, same town a few blocks away just a couple weeks ago, and bought it.
Was going to just throw it in the back of my truck, I didn't live more than 1 mile from the pick up spot, but I really liked the desk and I live up 4 flights in a 200 year old house so I got movers. Not a small thing as a graduate student but I figured what I didn't spend on the desk I could spare on moving it.
Got it home, got it upstairs and boy does it look nice. No chair. Let's get a chair. No chair looks right, this is a smart looking desk, rather! Really something else. Who made it? K-I-T-T-I-N-G-E-R...
So after finding this site, I have a Kittenger sheraton style mahogany desk that I love passionately enough to try and take with me in a house fire. Down 4 flights of stairs.
I am worried about how to care for it properly (heat and humidity) in a drafty 200 year old house on the north shore of MA. The house it came from cared for it exceedingly well. The thing is 40 years old and you'd never know it, an M-204, 54", leather top, but it has a few oddball characteristics- no brass knobs on the back, a modern key fixture and the brass knobs are a little smaller than the means by which they are fixed on the drawers. The pictures I've seen of the M-204, all the pulls are the same size or larger.
Any help or assistance you could provide gratefully accepted. I realize this might not be the place to post this thread, but I thought it may be a start. I've been a little afraid to use the desk since...
You picked up a Kittinger Desk for $ 100? That's amazing! There are collectors for those pieces, even companies like this that specialize in brokering older Kittinger pieces: http://www.elmwoodfurniture.com/ If the desk is in halfway decent shape you made a major score, these routinely sell for $ 2K and up in the used market.
Care is minimal, If the desk has a leather insert top, just clean and condition the leather as you would any hide periodically. For the wood, use a polish or a wax periodically, preferably one with no silicones in it (such as Pledge, etc). Enjoy the desk, and realize you can sell it for much more than you paid for it.
Duane Collie
Straight answers from thirty-six years in the business.
My Private Messages are Disabled - Please ask questions here in the forum.
Yes, and here she is. Stupid beautiful desk. If "halfway decent shape" means it doesn't look a day over 10 years old, well. The gilt on the leather is still all there. Leather is whole. Like I said, I'd try and get out with it in a fire if I wasn't stopped. Stupid beautiful desk. Kittinger has another convert...
Last edited by JoEmpress; 11-16-2015 at 10:57 PM. Reason: The pictures are upside down!
I apologize, the pictures are upside down and I have no idea how to fix that!