User:Clawfoot

The Clawfoot Bath
A Clawfoot bath or bath bath tub is a freestanding bath used for bathing, typically supported by metal or wooden feet.

The Clawfoot style of feet
The distinctive styling of Clawfeet dates from the late 18th Century. English furniture borrowed heavily from an Eastern design motif of a mythological animal clasping in its claws a pearl or precious stone. The symbolism was of strength protecting beauty, and the clawfoot bath draws on this design. This design is also known as Ball and Claw, and examples of this can be seen on furniture made throughout Europe and North America between the late 18th and early 20th Centuries.

The Great Clawfoot Bath Hoax
The history of the clawfoot bath is really the history of domestic architecture in the developed world since the late 19th Century. From being an object - and a practice - of ostentation and luxury, the bathroom has become a given and the virtues of bathing have become self evident. Despite this until recently the history of the clawfoot bath has been confused with a spoof by HK Mencken known as the [Bath Tub Hoax]. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bathtub_hoax

The Clawfoot Bath Today
There are currently 3 broad styles of Clawfoot Baths

1 - Classic Slipper and Bateau Baths

2 - Revivals of single and double ender baths

3 - Originals drawing on Clawfoot themes but often without feet

Examples of these designs are as follows: