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Lot Essay
The secretaire has richly-figured mahogany panels flanked by pilasters and is fitted with a Bramah lock, whose stamp was in use between 1800 and 1860. A very similar secretaire with panels framed by reeded and tablet-cornered ribbons, was among the furniture that Gillows of London and Lancaster supplied to John Cust, 1st Earl Brownlow (d. 1853) for Belton House, Lincolshire and Carlton House Terrace. It too had a fallfront with Bramah lock enclosing racks and drawers. The secretaire was sold by the Lord Brownlow, Belton House, Christie's house sale, 30 April-2 May 1984, lot 102.
Similar panels appear on a breakfront secretaire-bookcase that was supplied by Gillows in 1807 to John Lloyd Wynne (d. 1862) of Coed Coch, Denbighshire. Its sketch appears in their Estimate Sketch Book for November 1806 (see lot 234, Christie's London, 18 April 1996).
A similar secretaire formed part of the furniture supplied by Gillows in the early 19th Century for Heveningham Hall, Suffolk. Another related secretaire, likely to have been manufactured by Gillows, is impressed with the stamp used in the 1830s by the Great Queen Street retailers M. Willson (C. Gilbert, Pictorial Dictionary of Marked London Furniture, Leeds, 1996, no. 1005).
Similar panels appear on a breakfront secretaire-bookcase that was supplied by Gillows in 1807 to John Lloyd Wynne (d. 1862) of Coed Coch, Denbighshire. Its sketch appears in their Estimate Sketch Book for November 1806 (see lot 234, Christie's London, 18 April 1996).
A similar secretaire formed part of the furniture supplied by Gillows in the early 19th Century for Heveningham Hall, Suffolk. Another related secretaire, likely to have been manufactured by Gillows, is impressed with the stamp used in the 1830s by the Great Queen Street retailers M. Willson (C. Gilbert, Pictorial Dictionary of Marked London Furniture, Leeds, 1996, no. 1005).