Determining Authenticity and/or Age of Furniture?

I am wondering if anyone has any general tips or advice for ascertaining the authenticity of older-looking furniture, particularly any midcentury modern style pieces as they are very trendy and in high demand. Because of the trend, numerous manufacturers put out furniture designed to look like it was made in, say, the 1960's, but was in fact made in this decade.

I'm relatively new to the game here - beyond a fascination with collecting things, scoping out thrift stores for hidden antiques, and a lifelong obsession with Antiques Roadshow, I don't have much experience "appraising" items. I work at a second hand furniture store now, so I come across many different items and I often find myself fixating on certain ones, determined to find its origin/age/manufacturer. Stuff of relatively little consequence (hence my username) but still very engrossing for me.

For instance, I came across this couch, which based on the fact that it's a trundle bed and its design, I believed could be from the 1940's.

I figured it had been reupholstered and that explained the surprisingly good condition. But when I looked up "Parkhill" - which is the name underneath - I was led to the website of a contemporary furniture company who design pieces in the style of older furniture.

I realized how easy it is to be fooled so of course I researched things like determining types of wood, techniques, etc. found in genuine midcentury furniture. Still, I've come across certain items that I struggle to place.

I rely primarily on google reverse image search to help me solve these "mysteries" and it usually leads me in helpful directions. A lot of the time though I can't find anything quite like what I'm looking at, and I wonder if there's any way to really know - particularly if there are few markings, the pieces may have been reupholstered, the markings are from some obscure defunct Canadian company (I live in Canada) and so on.

Here are a couple more examples; I suppose I am just wondering if anyone has any advice or special "keys" they turn to when assessing furniture like this.

 

@verybrad
@Ghopper1924

a couple of tips....

1. not everything we would like to see has been uploaded to the web.

2. looking at your photo's.....the 1st thing that would be asked is.....please show us the underside....so we can see ' how ' it was made and if there are any markings .
Those 2 things can be more important for research ....that a straight on pic of the item itself !

3. period fabrics, matching period designs.... is a good indication of authenticity...
You can place a new fabric on an old chair, it's much harder to place an old fabric ...on a new chair ...

4. Books and old catalogs & advertisements are an invaluable source of proper attribution. They are usually more reliable than what's on the web.....and at least provide corroboration , to what can be gleaned there.

4 1/2 . Wear. Patterns of wear on furniture can help to understand , how they were used, how they were cared for ...& the time it took to get them in their present condition.

5. Time........ study....... and more time !!!!

 

Oooopsy.....

6. Hardware. It's far from conclusive ....but should be taken into account.
We see a lot of furniture here.....with the wrong hardware on it.......but seeing the right hardware, original to the period......well that's always a good sign !!

 

What komokwa said. And I would add in your local library, and that invaluable person who sits the desk where you go to ask questions.

 

Experience! The pieces you show all look vintage to my eye. You may not find exact matches to them. They appear to be knock-offs, rather than designer pieces.

 

Thank you so much I sometimes either don't get the chance to look at the bottom for very long, forget to take a picture, or just shrug when there's nothing of note. With the blue cushioned chair I do remember we peeled off a bunch of rotting paper that was underneath.

Thank you for your advice! I was leading towards the same conclusion, a lot of the stuff I've come across seems "Danish inspired" but of course not likely anything authentic...for example, this old green club chair. I love it but the foam is disintegrating.



I'm still baffled by the striped trundle couch but don't want to enlist the help of another person just to lift it up and double check the "Parkhill" tag we saw. It strikes me as odd that a contemporary manufacturer would design something to look that way but who knows.