POSSIBLY BY GILES GRENDEY, CIRCA 1730

This pattern chair has been traditionally associated with the celebrated Clerkenwell cabinet-maker Giles Grendey (d.1780). A set of twelve virtually identical chairs bear his trade label. One from the set is illustrated in C. Gilbert, Pictorial Dictionary of Marked London Furniture, Leeds, 1996, pp. 31 and 32, fig. 435. Grendey's business was prolific and there is an identifiable group of this model with minor variations in carved details which includes: a pair offered by Theodore and Ruth Baum, Sotheby's New York, 22 October 2004, lot 407 (previously sold, Christie's, London, 16 November 1995, lot 50, £73,000). Another pair, almost certainly from the same set as the Baum chairs, was sold by the Trustees of the S. T. Cook Will Trust, Sotheby's, New York, 16 October 1993, lot 347 ($151,000).