WETHERSFIELD, CONNECTICUT, CIRCA 1760

With the distinctive blocked ogee shaping on its skirt, this dressing table illustrates a design favored by Wethersfield, Connecticut cabinetmakers during the eighteenth century. It relates to examples in the Porter-Belter and Francis groups as defined and discussed by Thomas Kugelman, Alice Kugelman and Robert Lionetti. As seen on these comparable forms, this table features convex knee returns applied directly to the front of the apron, cabriole legs with bowl shaped padded disc feet, step molded edges, and a small central shell featuring convex rays with a brass pull directly above and a recess in its apron directly below (Thomas P. Kugelman and Alice K. Kugelman with Robert Lionetti, Connecticut Valley Furniture (Hartford, 2005), pp. 49-69; see also John T. Kirk, Connecticut Furniture: Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries (Hartford, 1967), p. 102, fig. 179; Kevin Sweeney, "Furniture and furniture making in mid-eighteenth century Wethersfield, Connecticut," The Magazine Antiques (May 1984), p. 1158, fig. 5).