Lot Essay
This marquetry sarcophagus form tea caddy is a further strand to the distinguished group of furniture of the 1750s and 1760s commissioned by the Craven family. These indicate that the 4th Baron and 1st Earl of Craven were patronising one or more of the very best London cabinet-makers in this period - including in all probability Thomas Chippendale, John Cobb and Messrs. Mayhew and Ince. The best known of the furniture is the magnificent Chippendale library desk sold from Combe Abbey in 1961 and which was most recently sold from the Hochschild Collection in 1978 (Connoisseur, April 1982). The second from this period is the carved mahogany canopied bed that was sold by Cornelia, Countess of Craven, Christie's London, 11 April 1923, lot 99 and again, anonymously, Christie's Monaco, 20 June 1994, lot 219. The design of that bed is very closely related to a signed drawing by the architect James Paine that survives at Nostell Priory. The third is the celebrated pair of dining room urns and pedestals, sold from Tythrop Park, Oxfordshire, Christie's London, 27 April 1995, lot 12 and now in the Gerstenfeld Collection, Washington D.C.