USING SPART OR SPANISH BROOM IN MANUFACTURING SEATS OF ALL DESCRIPTIONS
Year: 1858

page_text: LETTERS PATENT to Frederic Wilhelm Alexandre Casper and Guillaume
Henry Schmahl, both of No. 152, Rue du Faubourg, St. Martin, Paris,
for the Invention of "USING SPART OR SPANISH BROOM IN MANUFACTURING
SEATS OF ALL DESCRIPTIONS."
Sealed the 28th June 1859, and dated the 31st December 1858.
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by the said Frederic Wilhelm Alex-
andre Casper and Guillaume Henry Schmahl at the Office of the Comi-
missioners of Patents, with their Petition, on the 31st December 1858.
We, FREDERIC WILHELM ALEXANDRE CASPER and GUILLAUME HENRY
SCHMAHL, both of No. 152, Rue du Faubourg, St. Martin, Paris, do hereby
declare the nature of the said Invention for "USING SPART OR SPANISH BROOM
IN MANUFACTURING SEATS OF ALL DESCRIPTIONS," to be as follows:-
The Invention consists in using spart, which is a kind of rush or Spanish-
broom used in Spain for manufacturing (mats; we braid it and use it to form
the back and the cushion or seating of seats.

page_text: SPECIFICATION in pursuance of the conditions of the Letters Patent, filed
by the said Frederic Wilhelm Alexandre Casper and Guillaume Henry
Schmahl in the Great Seal Patent Office on the 29th June 1859.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, we, FREDERIC
WILHELM ALEXANDRE CASPAR and GUILLAUME HENRY SCHMAHL, both of
No. 152, Rue du Faubourg, St. Martin, Paris, send greeting.
WHEREAS Her most Excellent Majesty Queen Victoria, by Her Letters
Patent, bearing date the Thirty-first day of December, in the year of our
Lord One thousand eight hundred and fifty-eight, in the twenty-second
year of Her reign, did, for Herself, Her heirs and successors, give and
grant unto us, the said Frederic Wilhelm Alexandre Caspar and Guillaume
Henry Schmahl, Her special licence that we, the said Frederic Wilhelm
Alexandre Caspar and Guillaume Henry Schmahl, our executors, adminis-
trators, and assigns, or such others as we, the said Frederic Wilhelm
Alexandre Casper and Guillaume Henry Schmahl, our executors, adminis-
trators, and assigns, should at any time agree with, and no others, from
time to time and at all times thereafter during the term therein expressed,
should and lawfully might make, use, exercise, and vend, within the United
Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, the Channel Islands, and Isle of
Man, an Invention for "USING SPART OR SPANISH BROOM IN MANUFACTURING
SEATS OF ALL DESCRIPTIONS," upon the condition (amongst others) that we, the
said Frederic Wilhelm Alexandre Casper and Guillaume Henry Schmahl, our
executors or administrators, by an instrument in writing under our, or one of
our or their, or one of their hands and seals, should particularly describe and
ascertain the nature of the said Invention, and in what manner the same
was to be performed, and cause the same to be filed in the Great Seal Patent
Office within six calendar months next and immediately after the date of the
said Letters Patent.
NOW KNOW YE, that we, the said Frederic Wilhelm Alexandre Caspar
and Guillaume Heury Sehmahl, do hereby declare the nature of our said
Invention, and in what manner the same is to be performed, to be particularly
described and ascertained in and by the following statement:-
Our Invention consists in using spart, a kind of slender shrub, growing in
some mountainous parts of Spain, for manufacturing seats of all descriptions,
but especially those for the use kiosques, bowers, green arbours, and other
exposed places.
The feet and frame of our seats are made either of common pliable wood,

page_text: bamboo, or cane, whilst the seating and back leaning surfaces are made of
twisted or braided spart, which is a soft and elastic material.
Our seats are very comfortable, and their shape can be modified in many
various ways. The back part can be covered up either with tapistry, velvet,
embroidery, or ornamental in any other manner. Various other household
pieces of furniture for adorning country seats, villas, or pavilions, can be made
in the same style and of the same materials, viz., tables, consoles, glass or
picture frames, footstools, flower pots, and other similar utensils.
The frame or skeleton is made, as we said before, of any kind of pliable
wood, such as ash, walnut tree, bamboo or cane; all the frame pieces are
suitably bent to the required shape, and tied together with strips of split
rattan, which are closely twisted round so as to hide the wood entirely; and to
exhibit only the outer texture or smooth and shining bark. In order to give
more stiffness to the seats, the footings may be connected together by diagonal
cross-pieces, and the seat is composed of a square wooden frame, as in common
seats, glued together, and nailed down upon the footing. The external face of
the seating frame is formed of interwoven strips of rattan, which are attached
with small nails at each end on the sides of the frame. Lastly, the back part
is composed of one or several compartments, according to the nature of the
seats, and in the said compartments light ornamental braided spart ribbons
may be attached so as to form various kinds of fancy figures, the shining
appearance and hue of the spart being very nearly the same as that of the
rattan; there is a complete harmony in the whole.
In witness whereof, we, the said Frederic Wilhelm Alexandre Caspar and
Guillaume Henry Schmahl, have hereunto set our hands and seals,
this Twenty-first day of June, in the year of our Lord One thousand
eight hundred and fifty-nine.
Signed and sealed in the presence of
L. D'AUBREVILLE, C. E.,
F. W. A. CASPER. (L.S.)
(L.S.)
G. H. SCHMAHL.
60, Boulevart de Strasbourg, Paris.