Origin Story | Beehive Hardware

A hive of industry, busy as a bee…

Confession. I've always been a hardware nerd. In our early days of sourcing salvage, Jimmy the Greek would turn up with a truck full of painted Victorian doors pulled out of a house on the verge of demolition. My job was to remove the hardware and reassemble it. The style of the mouldings, door handles, hooks, and hinges was the key to the house's history. Unfortunately, it was usually heavily painted. But we were busy bees in the workshop, stripping and restoring whatever came through the doors.
Once restored, the craftsmanship, intricate details and the beautiful timbers of these salvaged door knobs (& doors) would be revealed. Curiosity led me to research how the beehive motif originated and became an element in Victorian hardware. Read more...

 Louis Sullivan’s observation that “All things in nature have a shape, that is to say a form, an outward resemblance, that tells us what they are” resonates deeply with the Victorian design aesthetic. This period of design and architecture was not only about beauty and decorative elements but also reflected the meaning and values of the time.

To those who have not spent a lifetime looking at hardware, flowers, beehives, and other flourishes may appear simply as a decorative choice. However, history shows the beehive carried deeper meaning, evoking ideals of order, productivity, and moral virtue.  In the Victorian era, this became especially relevant as the Industrial Revolution transformed British life.  The beehive came to define the literal buzz of production and the structured efficiency and work ethic that underpinned Victorian society. It was a fitting metaphor for the ideal home: orderly, harmonious, and industrious in its own right.

Over the years, we’ve stripped and restored all styles of hardware. The beehive pattern was the most difficult due to the concentric rings carved into the materials such as ebony and oak. These rings—stacked in a dome-like shape—mimicked the traditional straw skeps used by beekeepers. Alongside the handles, we have painstakingly restored delicately carved timber escutcheons and tiny round buttons, which were made purely to hide the screws that fix a push plate to the door.  Such was the design finesse of the era.  

In Australia, beehive doorknobs are usually found in good-quality free-standing homes or grand terraces from the 1860s to the 1880s.  Beyond door handles, the motif appeared in sash window fasteners, drawer pulls, and finials. Whether in polished brass or dark-stained wood, beehive designs strike a balance between ornamental detail and refined symmetry. Today, original pieces are hard to come by, but it is possible to find specialist dealers and other hardware buffs with a hidden collection 😊 
 Check out all of our vintage hardware here

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