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Lot Essay
The elegant bookcase is embellished with arcaded cornice and mosaiced pointed-arch glazing in English gothic fashion, while its bureau is concealed behind trompe l'oeil drawers in a chest whose pointed and arched 'lambrequin' apron accompanies Grecian-scrolled feet. Its form and ornament, invented around 1780, was popularised by Messrs A. Hepplewhite & Co.'s, Cabinet-Maker and Upholsterer's Guide, 1788.
A golden satinwood chest-of-drawers, ribbon-banded in 'purplewood' and with the same patterned apron and feet featured in the 1789 'Estimate Sketch Book' of Gillow of London and Lancaster (L. Boynton, Gillow Furniture Designs 1760-1800; Royston, 1995, fig. 118). Its drawer tablets are also embellished with silvery wreath-handled medallions as adopted by Gillow at this period.
William Lever, 1st Viscount Leverhulme (1851-1925), the Sunlight Soap magnate, began by collecting English oak followed by 18th century French furniture. By the 1890s he committed himself to forming a collection representative of the best of British art - an endeavour that lasted for the last thirty years of his life. His pursuit of Georgian furniture was virtually unparalleled at the time, but fully evident by the turn-of-the-century at his homes at Thornton Manor, Merseyside and The Hill in Hampstead. His exceptional collection of furniture is only one manifestation of his passion for the English arts that are now largely housed in the Lady Lever Art Gallery, a museum that he established in Port Sunlight in 1922. This remarkable collection retains countless important examples of English eighteenth century cabinet-making acquired by Lever over a thirty year period.
A golden satinwood chest-of-drawers, ribbon-banded in 'purplewood' and with the same patterned apron and feet featured in the 1789 'Estimate Sketch Book' of Gillow of London and Lancaster (L. Boynton, Gillow Furniture Designs 1760-1800; Royston, 1995, fig. 118). Its drawer tablets are also embellished with silvery wreath-handled medallions as adopted by Gillow at this period.
William Lever, 1st Viscount Leverhulme (1851-1925), the Sunlight Soap magnate, began by collecting English oak followed by 18th century French furniture. By the 1890s he committed himself to forming a collection representative of the best of British art - an endeavour that lasted for the last thirty years of his life. His pursuit of Georgian furniture was virtually unparalleled at the time, but fully evident by the turn-of-the-century at his homes at Thornton Manor, Merseyside and The Hill in Hampstead. His exceptional collection of furniture is only one manifestation of his passion for the English arts that are now largely housed in the Lady Lever Art Gallery, a museum that he established in Port Sunlight in 1922. This remarkable collection retains countless important examples of English eighteenth century cabinet-making acquired by Lever over a thirty year period.