BY JOHNSTONE & JEANES, MID-19TH CENTURY

When Robert Jupe patented his 'Improved Expanding Table' in 1835, he was in partnership with John Johnstone at 67 New Bond Street. The firm was known as Johnstone, Jupe & Co., and this is the stamp or engraved signature that appears on tables made between 1835 and 1840. By 1840 Robert Jupe had left the partnership to form his own firm in Welbeck Street, and his name alone usually appears on later tables with this mechanism. Following Jupe's departure, John Johnstone formed a new partnership with Jeanes and their combined stamp appears on a variety of furniture in the early Victorian period. This table is extremely unusual for having the stamp of the later partnership that did not include Jupe himself. This suggests that Johnstone had some claim on the patent.

A similar 'Jupe' dining-table, stamped Johnstone & Jeanes, was sold anonymously, in these Rooms, 16 November 1995, lot 331. Another, with similar pattern of base although unstamped, was sold anonymously, in these Rooms, 6 July 1995, lot 118 and another was sold anonymously, Phillips, London, 23 April 1996, lot 277. Another related example is illustrated in C. Gilbert, Pictorial Dictionary of Marked London Furniture, Leeds, 1996, p. 285, fig. 535. This table was possibly that sold anonymously, Sotheby's, London, 17 June 1983, lot 132. Two 'Jupe' patent tables with the same pattern of base are illustrated in the Dining-room at Mottisfont Priory in H. Avray Tipping, 'Mottisfont Priory, Hampshire', Country Life, 19 November 1921, p. 656, fig. 9.