Lot Essay
The palm-flowered leopard monopodiae relate to a pattern published in George Smith's Collection of Designs for Household Furniture and Interior Decoration, London, 1808, p. 87. They feature on a suite of drawing-room seat furniture supplied circa 1805 by Gillows of Oxford Street to Colonel Hughes for Kinmel Park, Denbighshire. It was partly in reference to this suite that W.L. Hughes wrote to his uncle on 25 July 1907, 'I do flatter myself that your two rooms will be the neatest and most tasteful in your neighbourhood' (quoted in 'The Hughes Papers', Transactions of the Historic Society of Lancashire and Cheshire, 1951, vol. 103, p. 117). At the time of the original Gillows commission Kinmel Park was being reconstructed under the supervision of Samuel Wyatt (d. 1807). Wyatt had a particularly close relationship with Gillows and it seems probably that he was responsible for the original design. One of the daybeds from the Kinmel suite was sold from the collection of Mr. Edward Sarofim in these Rooms, 16 November 1995, lot 143 and its pair is in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London (inv. no. W.38-1930).
Another table of this pattern but without its original mirror plate, was sold anonymously in these Rooms, 8 July 1993, lot 61. A writing-table with the same leopard monopodia was sold from the Coke Collection from Jenkyn Place, in these Rooms, 17 October 1996, lot 57.
Another table of this pattern but without its original mirror plate, was sold anonymously in these Rooms, 8 July 1993, lot 61. A writing-table with the same leopard monopodia was sold from the Coke Collection from Jenkyn Place, in these Rooms, 17 October 1996, lot 57.