The parlour chair, with scrolled crested 'vase' splat and legs enriched with pelta-scrolled cartouches corresponds to the early 18th Century Roman fashion introduced at the start of George I's reign by architects such as James Gibbs (d. 1754). Appropriately this 'vase-back' pattern of parlour chair was executed in Canton in the 1720s to be flower lacquered after the Japanese fashion (see C. Clunas, 'A Chinese Portrait Figure', Victoria and Albert Museum Album, no. 3, 1984, p. 50, fig. 7). A pair of chairs of this pattern, with straight rather than serpentined rail, was sold anonymously, in these Rooms, 8 June 1995, lot 216. A related pair of chairs, formerly in the possession of The Viscountess Ullswater, Campsea Ashe, Suffolk, was sold by John Tillotson, Esq., in these Rooms, 27 October 1980, lot 32. The latter had compass-fronted seats.