THIRD QUARTER 18TH CENTURY

The 'commode-table', intended to stand beneath the window-pier mirror of a George III reception Dressing Room, has Roman trussed and Grecian scrolled pilasters; while its rich inlay reflects the George III French fashion as introduced around 1760 by the Paris-trained ébéniste Pierre Langlois (d. 1767) of Tottenham Court Road. However, the elegance of its inlay of flowered rainceaux of Roman acanthus foliage relates more closely to the antique designs of Thomas Chippendale Junior's, Sketches of Ornament, 1779 (C. Gilbert, The Life and Work of Thomas Chippendale, 1978, vol. II, pp. 16-19). Its top is serpentined in a cupid-bow, and evokes lyric poetry with a trompe l'oeil of a rose-stem, sacred to Venus. This is displayed in a laurel-wreathed medallion and framed by Apollonian sunflowers issuing from a trophy of conjoined acanthus stems. The façade has a similarly bowed lambrequin apron, while its tablets display triumphal palms issuing from similar foliage that wreathes the golden sunflowered medallion-paterae, whose laurelled garlands provide drawer-handles. The medallions inlaid in the side tablets incorporate flowered lozenged compartments to recall Rome's Temple of Venus.