Lot Essay
This desk is designed in the French/Grecian manner invented by the Liverpool sculptor/cabinet-maker George Bullock (d. 1818) around the time of the establishment of his Piccadilly 'Grecian Rooms' in 1810. Its marble-like veneer of golden mottled oak is elegantly inlaid with ribbon-panels of Etruscan-black ebony providing paired pilasters for the plinth-capped 'commode' pedestals, while arched and palm-inlaid brackets, supporting the recessed leather-topped table terminate in Etruscan 'palm-bud' finials.
Such furniture was commissioned from Bullock in 1815 by George, Prince Regent, later King George IV for the exiled Emperor Napoleon's residence, New Longwood House, St. Helena. This tripartite form of desk/library-table features in Bullock's Library plan for New Longwood, which is preserved amongst the Lowe Papers at the British Museum (British Library, Ad. Mgss. 20, 222, folio 220) and indeed a mahogany desk of this pattern was supplied for St. Helena at a cost of #68. 5.0. Praised for its 'tasteful simplicity' in Rudolph Ackermann's Repository of Arts, the St. Helena furniture was meticulousy described in the Times article 'House and Furniture for Buonaparte' of 25 October 1815. This article stated that
'The library table is particularly elegant and mechanical ingenuity has been laboriously applied to furnish it with desks and drawers ... suited to every conveniece of study and accomodation'
A traced design for this pedestal pattern, featuring arabesque inlay, features in Wilkinson's tracings (Birmingham City Art Gallery, Mss. P.98), while the pearled inlay framing the top's leather pad featured in the designs for a heroic 'military trophy' scene that Bullock supplied to Matthew Robinson Boulton for Tew Park, Oxfordshire, circa 1817 (C. Wainwright et. al., George Bullock Cabinet- Maker, London, 1988, p. 90-91, no. 26). Finally, the sarcophagus form of the pedestals is reminiscent of Bullock's recurrent side cabinet pattern with a shaped top, for instance the pair of cabinets he supplied to William Roscoe (ibid., p.65, no.6), circa 1810.
A mahogany-veneered desk of this pattern, formerly in the collection of the Earls of Granville, was advertised by Paul Couts Ltd. in The Antique Collector, 1984, while another, also in mahogany and with end-drawers, was sold anonymously in these Rooms, 7 July 1994, lot 155.
Such furniture was commissioned from Bullock in 1815 by George, Prince Regent, later King George IV for the exiled Emperor Napoleon's residence, New Longwood House, St. Helena. This tripartite form of desk/library-table features in Bullock's Library plan for New Longwood, which is preserved amongst the Lowe Papers at the British Museum (British Library, Ad. Mgss. 20, 222, folio 220) and indeed a mahogany desk of this pattern was supplied for St. Helena at a cost of #68. 5.0. Praised for its 'tasteful simplicity' in Rudolph Ackermann's Repository of Arts, the St. Helena furniture was meticulousy described in the Times article 'House and Furniture for Buonaparte' of 25 October 1815. This article stated that
'The library table is particularly elegant and mechanical ingenuity has been laboriously applied to furnish it with desks and drawers ... suited to every conveniece of study and accomodation'
A traced design for this pedestal pattern, featuring arabesque inlay, features in Wilkinson's tracings (Birmingham City Art Gallery, Mss. P.98), while the pearled inlay framing the top's leather pad featured in the designs for a heroic 'military trophy' scene that Bullock supplied to Matthew Robinson Boulton for Tew Park, Oxfordshire, circa 1817 (C. Wainwright et. al., George Bullock Cabinet- Maker, London, 1988, p. 90-91, no. 26). Finally, the sarcophagus form of the pedestals is reminiscent of Bullock's recurrent side cabinet pattern with a shaped top, for instance the pair of cabinets he supplied to William Roscoe (ibid., p.65, no.6), circa 1810.
A mahogany-veneered desk of this pattern, formerly in the collection of the Earls of Granville, was advertised by Paul Couts Ltd. in The Antique Collector, 1984, while another, also in mahogany and with end-drawers, was sold anonymously in these Rooms, 7 July 1994, lot 155.