This bedroom-apartment close-stool, enriched with moulded panels in holly, is designed by George Bullock (d. 1818), cabinet-maker of 4 Tenterden Street, Hanover Square, and conceived in the manner of a Grecian cippus chest with inverted palm-bulb feet and reeded-paterae acroteria. It formed part of the bedroom furnishings commissisoned in 1816 for the 'Elizabethan' mansion at Tew Park, Oxfordshire by Matthew Boulton, and was invoiced in 1817 with six other 'Night Stools', each costing #14.10s'. They were designed en suite with an oak panelled bed with 'Holly mouldings and patteras' and 'damask pattern chintz' upholstery (Christie's house sale at Tew Park, 27-29 May 1987, lot 247). A Bullock bed with related features was illustrated in Rudolph Ackermann's Repository of Arts, November 1816 (series 11, vol 2 pl. 26), where it was praised for its 'tasteful simplicity'.

Its design relates to a pattern invented by Bullock in November 1815 as part of the furnishings executed under the direction of George, Prince Regent, later King George IV for the Emperor Napoleon's residence on St. Helena (C. Wainwright et al., George Bullock Cabinet-Maker, London, 1988, p. 93, fig. 40). Its style might also indicate the influence of the architect Richard Bridgens, who is credited with the design of the Grecian Rooms at the Piccadilly 'Museum' established in 1810 by Georges' brother William Bullock (C. Wainwright et al., op. cit., p.23). It also reflects the 'Baronial Magnificence' of George Bullock's furnishings introduced at this time at Speke Hall, Lancashire, possibly while working in partnership with the architect Joseph M. Gandy (d. 1843) (C. Wainwright et. al., op. cit., p. 61-4).
A companion commode-stool was acquired from Tew by the Walker Art Gallery, Merseyside.