The design for the present secrtaire cabinet is based on an original model of a table de toilet by Jean-Franois Oeben, executed in the latter's workshop by his employee, Jean-Franois Leleu, and now in the Wallace Collection, London. The Wallace model was exhibited at the Petit Trianon in 1867, the year of the Paris Exposition Universelle, and it is likely that copies and adaptations of the piece were produced by pre-eminent Parisian bnistes shortly thereafter (see Sotheby's London, 2 October 1998, lot 291, for an example signed by Paul Sormani).