Lot Essay
The Master's chair, with its antique-fluted pilasters, ribbon-fretted splat and acanthus-wrapped corners, relates in part to the 'Chippendale' Master's Chair from the Plymouth Freemasons Hall (see M. Harris, The English Chair, London, 1946 pl. 96). It also relates to one from a set of masonic armchairs of the South Middlesex Lodge, circa 1730 at the Victoria and Albert Museum, while its foliated and truss-scrolled legs terminate in Jupiter eagle-claws in the fashion adopted for the Warden's Chair of the London Company of Fishmongers that has been dated about 1750 (op cit. p. 168).
Its near pair, illustrated in G.W. Whiteman, Halls and Treasures of the City Companies, p. 105, was sold with the present chair, anonymous sale, Christie's, London, 6 July 1989, lot 33 (£81,000).
Its near pair, illustrated in G.W. Whiteman, Halls and Treasures of the City Companies, p. 105, was sold with the present chair, anonymous sale, Christie's, London, 6 July 1989, lot 33 (£81,000).