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Lot Essay
This elegant pier-table's elliptic-medallion form reflects the 'Roman' manner of decorating with medallions and tablets popularised in the 1760s by George III's court architect Robert Adam (d. 1792) and illustrated in his Works in Architecture, London, 1773/4.
A beribboned and rose-centred garland wreaths its marquetried top, which is banded by a palm-flowered ribbon-guilloche and is ray-parquetried from an 'Apollo' Palmyreen-sunflower enclosed in a palm-flowered and scalloped medallion. Its colourful floral inlay typifies the fine marquetry executed at the Golden Square workshops established in 1759 by Messrs. Mayhew and Ince, authors of The Universal System of Household Furniture, 1762. It corresponds, in particular, to a pair of their finest flowered table-tops supplied in the early 1780s for the Saloon piers at Chirk Castle, Denbighshire (L. Wood, Catalogue of Commodes, 1994, p. 220, fig. 212 ). The table-frame's ribbon guilloche also evokes Adam's 'Roman' manner of decorating rooms with vase ornament after the manner of an ancient 'columbarium' chamber decked with 'Etruscan' vases. Here, poetic laurels festoon sacred-urns and beribboned palms.
The same frieze pattern features on an elliptic commode with hermed legs that was supplied in 1782 for William Henry, Marquess of Titchfield, afterwards 3rd Duke of Portland (d.1809), Viceroy of Ireland, by William Moore (d.1815). Moore had previously been employed over a number of years by Messrs Mayhew and Ince (W. A. Thorpe, 'William Moore', Country Life, 3 May 1946, fig. 3). In that same year Moore advertised his Dublin establishment entitled 'The Inlaid Ware-room', in the Dublin Evening Post. He mentioned his 'remarkable fine coloured woods, and elegant finished work' while informing 'those who may want Inlaid work, that by his close attention to business and instructions to his men, he has brought the manufacture to such perfection, to be able to sell for almost one half of his original prices. As the greatest demand is for Pier-tables, he has just finished in the newest taste, a great variety of patterns, sizes and prices, from three Guineas to Twenty...'. The same frieze also appears on a commode attributed to Moore, now in the Victoria and Albert Museum as well as on a cabinet, whose hermed feet are likewise inlaid with laurel festoons (M. Tomlin, Adam Period Furniture in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, 1982, p. 172; the cabinet was sold Sotheby's London, 4 July 1979, lot 74).
A beribboned and rose-centred garland wreaths its marquetried top, which is banded by a palm-flowered ribbon-guilloche and is ray-parquetried from an 'Apollo' Palmyreen-sunflower enclosed in a palm-flowered and scalloped medallion. Its colourful floral inlay typifies the fine marquetry executed at the Golden Square workshops established in 1759 by Messrs. Mayhew and Ince, authors of The Universal System of Household Furniture, 1762. It corresponds, in particular, to a pair of their finest flowered table-tops supplied in the early 1780s for the Saloon piers at Chirk Castle, Denbighshire (L. Wood, Catalogue of Commodes, 1994, p. 220, fig. 212 ). The table-frame's ribbon guilloche also evokes Adam's 'Roman' manner of decorating rooms with vase ornament after the manner of an ancient 'columbarium' chamber decked with 'Etruscan' vases. Here, poetic laurels festoon sacred-urns and beribboned palms.
The same frieze pattern features on an elliptic commode with hermed legs that was supplied in 1782 for William Henry, Marquess of Titchfield, afterwards 3rd Duke of Portland (d.1809), Viceroy of Ireland, by William Moore (d.1815). Moore had previously been employed over a number of years by Messrs Mayhew and Ince (W. A. Thorpe, 'William Moore', Country Life, 3 May 1946, fig. 3). In that same year Moore advertised his Dublin establishment entitled 'The Inlaid Ware-room', in the Dublin Evening Post. He mentioned his 'remarkable fine coloured woods, and elegant finished work' while informing 'those who may want Inlaid work, that by his close attention to business and instructions to his men, he has brought the manufacture to such perfection, to be able to sell for almost one half of his original prices. As the greatest demand is for Pier-tables, he has just finished in the newest taste, a great variety of patterns, sizes and prices, from three Guineas to Twenty...'. The same frieze also appears on a commode attributed to Moore, now in the Victoria and Albert Museum as well as on a cabinet, whose hermed feet are likewise inlaid with laurel festoons (M. Tomlin, Adam Period Furniture in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, 1982, p. 172; the cabinet was sold Sotheby's London, 4 July 1979, lot 74).