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Lot Essay
These richly-carved chairs are conceived in the elegant French antique fashion introduced around 1780 by architects such as James Wyatt (d.1813). Hepplewhite and Co. illustrated their pattern of triumphal-arched crest, as well as the hollow-swept arm and husk-festooned 'herm' leg, in various chair designs in The Cabinet-Maker and Upholsterer's Guide, 1788.
They display poetic trophies, appropriate to a library, comprised of Apollo's laurel-festooned lyre, while their floral garlands recall lyric poetry by uniting Venus's sacred rose with the sunflower of Apollo, leader of the Muses of artistic inspiration.
The original set, which is likely to have comprised twelve armchairs, are likely to have been commissioned for Arley, Cheshire, by Sir Peter Warburton, 5th Baronet (d.1813) following his marriage to Alice, daughter of Rev'd John Parker, in 1781.
The chairs' superb carving typifies the high quality of the contemporary work of the London and Lancaster firm of Gillows, such as their dining-room furniture supplied for Workington Hall, Cumberland in 1788 (see Sir. A. Heal, The London Furniture Makers, London, 1953, figs. 42-45).
They display poetic trophies, appropriate to a library, comprised of Apollo's laurel-festooned lyre, while their floral garlands recall lyric poetry by uniting Venus's sacred rose with the sunflower of Apollo, leader of the Muses of artistic inspiration.
The original set, which is likely to have comprised twelve armchairs, are likely to have been commissioned for Arley, Cheshire, by Sir Peter Warburton, 5th Baronet (d.1813) following his marriage to Alice, daughter of Rev'd John Parker, in 1781.
The chairs' superb carving typifies the high quality of the contemporary work of the London and Lancaster firm of Gillows, such as their dining-room furniture supplied for Workington Hall, Cumberland in 1788 (see Sir. A. Heal, The London Furniture Makers, London, 1953, figs. 42-45).