Luxury Office Furniture

Luxury office furniture changes what a spare room is for. Put a desk with real weight in it, a turned leg, a figured top, a drawer that closes with a soft knock, and the room stops being the place the laundry waits. It becomes a study. Everything on this page is a desk, on purpose. In a home office the desk decides the mood, and the chair, the lamp and the shelves take their cue from it.

These are desks for a house, not a floor plate. They share the restraint of the rest of our high end furniture, so one can sit in a library corner or a bedroom alcove without the room turning corporate. If you came looking for task chairs or a fit-out for a whole floor, this is not that page.

Luxury office furniture reads from the desk outward

Start with the top. It is the largest flat surface the room holds, and you see it every time you walk in. A dark top pulls the room toward it. A pale one lets the walls lead. If you are drawn to walnut desks, choose the desk first and let the shelving and the rug match its depth, rather than buying the rest and hoping a desk agrees with it later.

A walnut desk goes darker after six

Daylight flatters walnut. It finds the grain and a little red in the brown. Under a warm lamp the same top drops a shade and the figure settles into one dark field. Noir's Ebony Walnut, on the Bridge, Marigold and Voltes, sits close to black by evening. Dark Walnut, on the Lobster and Memphis, keeps some of its brown. Plan for the evening version. It is the one you will sit with.

Black metal lets the floor show through

A desk on a steel base weighs less to the eye than a wood box, because you can see floor beneath it. The Tessio floats a racetrack-oval white oak top over curved matte black pedestals. The Sagrada is industrial steel from top to foot. In a small room, that visible floor is worth more than another drawer.

Choosing a luxury executive desk, or something quieter

Partner desks want the middle of the room

The Kingsley partner desk is 84 inches wide and 40 deep, with turned legs, inset drawers and brass pulls, made to be worked from both sides. The Campaign partner desk, in mahogany with brass side plates, runs 76 inches. Pieces this size are meant to be seen from every angle. Push one against a wall and you lose the reason you bought it.

Buy for the work you actually do

The common mistake is buying a luxury executive desk for laptop work. A bank of drawers looks generous in a photograph and heavy in a small room, where it usually faces the door. If your files live in the cloud, buy the surface and keep storage on a wall. The Portuguese desk is a fair middle ground: spool-turned legs, a carved apron, solid mahogany and three drawers, with a 60-inch small version for tighter rooms.

Writing desks for a corner or an alcove

Smaller rooms do better with a writing desk. The Imogen is 56 inches of book-matched walnut burl on tall tapering legs, finished with antique brass ferrules, and one drawer with a removable pencil tray. The Greenington Santa Cruz leaning desk is 25 inches wide and rests against the wall, with two shelves above the work surface.

A modern luxury home office in mahogany, oak, bamboo and steel

Here is the nuance most shops skip: a finish name is not a species. The Greenington Wynn and Currant are solid bamboo in a Black Walnut color, and the grain gives it away, running in fine straight lines where walnut wanders. The Portuguese desks are mahogany in hand-rubbed black, brown or white. Read each listing for the build before you decide what you are paying for.

Sizes run from a 30-inch teak writing desk with a marble top to the 84-inch Kingsley. There are oak writing desks from Moe's, adjustable-height drafting desks, and Pale and white finishes for rooms that would rather not go dark.

High end office furniture for the hours after dark

A study gets used at night far more than a showroom ever is. Light the desk from the side, low and warm, and the grain does the rest. A brass lamp warms a dark top. A leather blotter quiets it. Against a charcoal wall, even a pale oak desk becomes the brightest thing in the room once the sun is gone, which is exactly where your eyes should land when you sit down.