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Lot Essay
Almost certainly the 'Large size Grecian Sofa with thick squab in seat, round bolster, cushions -- 12.12.00' recorded on John Williams' invoice to 'His Grace The Duke of Bedford', dated 5 Nov. 1814.
John Williams (d.1819) is recorded in G.Beard and C.Gilbert, Dictionary of English Furniture Makers, 1660-1840, FHS, 1986, as working in the parish of St. Mary Major, Exeter, Devon between 1812-19.
The sofa supplied for Georgiana, Duchess of Bedford's Drawing Room, is designed in the antique fashion with Grecian couch ends. With its robustly turned legs it would have harmonised with the room's central table that was bordered with bobbin-turning in the 'Elizabethan' fashion promoted by the Jeffry Wyatt, Endsleigh's architect.
John Williams (d.1819) is recorded in G.Beard and C.Gilbert, Dictionary of English Furniture Makers, 1660-1840, FHS, 1986, as working in the parish of St. Mary Major, Exeter, Devon between 1812-19.
The sofa supplied for Georgiana, Duchess of Bedford's Drawing Room, is designed in the antique fashion with Grecian couch ends. With its robustly turned legs it would have harmonised with the room's central table that was bordered with bobbin-turning in the 'Elizabethan' fashion promoted by the Jeffry Wyatt, Endsleigh's architect.