POSSIBLY DESIGNED BY JOHN HOBCROFT

The table's pillared legs are tiered with blocks after a chair-leg pattern featured in Thomas Chippendale's The Gentleman and Cabinet-Maker's Director, London, 3rd ed., 1762 (pl. XIX). Such blocks appear to be indebted to the Louis Quatorze 'garden seat' architecture with pilasters enriched with drip-work blocks, which featured in Daniel Marot's Oeuvres, 1703. The blocks, binding this table's 'bamboo' pillars, are imbricated with dolphin scales recalling the nature deity Venus, while the frieze tablet is fretted with double-railed Chinese paling. Its pillars, imbricated blocks, flowered-trellis tablets, Chinese paling as well as the picturesque scrolls all feature on a celebrated suite of furniture formerly at Padworth House, Berkshire. The suite, that is likely to have been introduced by Christopher Griffith (d. 1776) on inheriting the estate in 1765, comprises a richly embroidered settee, chairs, stools and firescreens. Christopher Griffith consulted John Hobcroft (d. 1803), carpenter and builder of Titchfield, who was also involved in the design and manufacture of furniture. So it is possible that, as well as providing designs for aggrandising the house, he also designed this suite of furniture (illustrated in H. Avray Tipping, 'Padworth House - II', Country Life, 23 September 1922, pp. 372-377 and P. Maquoid and R. Edwards, The Dictionary of English Furniture, London, 1954, rev.ed., vol. III, p. 179, fig. 54).
The Padworth furniture also relates to the 'Ingress Abbey' seat furniture that was acquired by Moss Harris is 1922. A settee from this suite was acquired by the Victoria and Albert Museum in 1946 (see Macquoid and Edwards, ibid., vol. III , p. 84, fig. 33).
A related pembroke table is illustrated in Macquoid and Edwards, ibid., vol. III, p. 266, fig. 2.