Lingerie Chests: Furniture
Designed for Women Only

The latest quirky piece of furniture companies are pushing: the lingerie chest.

These tall dressers for the bedroom, created specifically for organizing women's delicate underthings, are much narrower than many bedroom dressers. Butler Specialty Co.'s new lingerie chest is 21.5 inches wide, while most dressers are between 42 inches and 54 inches wide. They also tend to have smaller, shallower drawers than dressers.

Traditional styles have seven drawers -- one for each day of the week -- but many modern versions have six or eight drawers. These pieces first became popular in 18th-century France, where they were known as "chiffoniers" or "semainiers" and were originally designed to store linens, sewing items and smaller pieces of apparel. Companies such as Lexington Home Brands and Butler have been rolling out these pieces partly to nudge homeowners to branch out and buy items beyond basic dressers and armoires for the bedroom. Some options:

• Lexington has a 60-inch-high lingerie chest in its World of Bob Timberlake collection that's done in cherry solids and veneers and has six drawers ($1,400, go to Lexington.com for a store locator).



• Bombay Co. has a 51-inch-high "Hepplewhite" lingerie chest that has seven drawers, comes in a vintage mahogany finish, and has brass hardware ($449, at Bombaycompany.com).



• This spring, Butler Specialty Co. will start selling a $1,799 lingerie chest in its Connoisseur's Collection that's 55 inches high, has eight drawers and has drawer fronts featuring inlays in myrtle burl, cherry, walnut, oak, pine and mahogany (style No. 163590, go to Butlerspecialty.net for a store locator).

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