CIRCA 1775, ORIGINALLY DESIGNED FOR TORCHERES

The caryatid-supported candelabra/vases reflect the taste for the 'antique' popularized by the Royal architect William Chambers with his A Treatise on Civil Architecture published in 1759 following his studies in Italy and France. Chambers's chapter devoted to 'Persians and Caryatides' clearly influenced the silver and ormolu-manufacturer Matthew Boulton, who was a subscriber, for his 'Caryatic Vase' designs. He later supplied similar 'King's Vases' to George III in 1770-71, whose design was initially drawn by Chambers's assistant John Yenn (see J. Harris and M. Snodin, Sir William Chambers: Architect to George III, New Haven and London, 1996, pp. 155-156, figs. 230-231). The present candelabra/vases were likely placed on torcheres placed at the corners of a room. A set of four such torcheres headed by similar draped classical figures was supplied by the St. Martin's Lane cabinet-maker William Gates to the Prince of Wales in 1781 for the Queen's House (now Buckingham Palace). Two of the Royal torcheres were sold by the Richard Ormonde Shuttleworth Charitable Trust, Christie's, London, 8 July 1993, lot 50. These too were thought to have been designed by Yenn. Torcheres displaying classical caryatids and rams masks appear in the designs of Robert and James Adam in their Works in Architecture (1773), while Adam's drawing for a tripod pedestal supplied to the 6th Earl of Coventry in 1767 closely compares (E. Harris, The Furniture of Robert Adam, London, 1963, pl. 134). Another pair of ram-headed candelabra on Adam style torcheres was sold Sotheby's, New York, 1 February 1992, lot 336 ($82,500).