A GEORGE III SATINWOOD SERPENTINE COMMODE
No VAT will be charged on the hammer price, but VA… Read more THE PROPERTY OF A GENTLEMAN (LOTS 150-155)
A GEORGE III SATINWOOD SERPENTINE COMMODE

Details
A GEORGE III SATINWOOD SERPENTINE COMMODE
Crossbanded overall in amaranth, the shaped rectangular top above four graduated mahogany-lined drawers, the top drawer with a green baize-lined slide and with pen-drawer and two associated glass inkwells opening to the right side, on splayed feet, the handles apparently original, the top drawer previously fitted, restorations and replacements to the feet, the reverse with fragmentary depository label 'D. ALL'
33 in. (84 cm.) high; 36 in. (91.5 cm.) wide; 23 in. (58.5 cm.) deep
Special notice
No VAT will be charged on the hammer price, but VAT at 17.5% will be added to the buyer's premium which is invoiced on a VAT inclusive basis.

Lot Essay

The commode, with its silken veneer of golden satinwood framed in purple ribbon-bands of West Indian 'bois d'amarante' has an elegantly serpentined apron and Grecian-scrolled feet in the George III 'antique' fashion introduced around 1780. A 'Commode Dressing Table' of this pattern featured in Messrs. A. Hepplewhite and Co.'s The Cabinet-Maker and Upholsterer's Guide, 1788 (pl. 76) and also appeared in the 1789 Estimate Sketch Book of Gillows of London and Lancaster (L. Boynton (ed.), Gillow Furniture Designs 1760-1800, Royston, 1995, fig. 117).
The pattern for its 'poetic' handles, of pearled patterae festooned with beribboned laurels, also features in a contemporary metal-worker pattern-book (numbered 1842) (see N. Goodison, 'The Victoria and Albert Museum's Collection of Metal-Work Pattern Books', Furniture History, 1975, fig. 22).

More from Important English Furniture

View All
View All