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Lot Essay
This black and gilt-japanned chinoiserie cabinet is in the tradition of cabinets supplied to the fashionable clientèle of cabinet-makers such as the father and son partnership, William (d.1763) and John Linnell (d.1796). It relates closely to a design for a 'China Case' by Thomas Chippendale (d.1779), published in the 3rd edition of the Director, pl.CXXXIII.
William Linnell was one of the earliest designers and carvers producing furniture in the 'Chinese taste', in 1749 supplying carving, decoration and furnishing to the Duke of Bedford for a Chinese house in the grounds of Woburn Abbey, Bedfordshire that Horace Walpole described as 'the very first'. This was followed between 1752 and 1754 with the famous suite of japanned furniture commissioned by the 4th Duke of Beaufort for the Chinese Bedroom at Badminton House, Gloucestershire, comprising a spectacular bed with pagoda canopy, eight armchairs, dressing-commode and two pairs of standing shelves also with pagoda tops. The tripartite commode from this suite relates to a breakfront writing-table supplied by William Linnell in 1752 to Mrs. Elizabeth Montagu for her house in Hill Street, Mayfair, where she was installing her own 'Chinese' room just a short distance from the Beaufort's London house on Grosvenor Street. Mrs. Montagu's commission included a japanned cabinet-on-stand with pierced and applied lattice work, a characteristic feature of the Linnell chinoiserie style. Both the Duke and Mrs. Montagu were following the prevailing fashion for chinoiserie, in fact the latter had written as early as 1749 signaling the arrival of the 'gaudy goût of the Chinese' as a reaction to 'Grecian elegance and symmetry, or Gothic grandeur and magnificence' (A. Oswald, 'Mrs. Montagu and the Chinese Taste', Country Life, 30 April 1953, pp.1328-9).
The present example is closely related to a china cabinet with a similar pierced pagoda top exhibited by Blairman & Sons Ltd. at the Antique Dealers Fair, 1962 (p.25). Another comparable is the Kinross mahogany china cabinet, almost certainly supplied by Alexander Peter, circa 1755-60, to Sir James William Montgomery, 1st Baron Stanhope (d. 1803) and illustrated in P. Macquoid, A History of English Furniture, The Age of Mahogany, volume three, London, 1923, fig. 236 (sold 'The Exceptional Sale 2011', Christie's, London, 7 July 2011, lot 35, £97,250 including premium).
William Linnell was one of the earliest designers and carvers producing furniture in the 'Chinese taste', in 1749 supplying carving, decoration and furnishing to the Duke of Bedford for a Chinese house in the grounds of Woburn Abbey, Bedfordshire that Horace Walpole described as 'the very first'. This was followed between 1752 and 1754 with the famous suite of japanned furniture commissioned by the 4th Duke of Beaufort for the Chinese Bedroom at Badminton House, Gloucestershire, comprising a spectacular bed with pagoda canopy, eight armchairs, dressing-commode and two pairs of standing shelves also with pagoda tops. The tripartite commode from this suite relates to a breakfront writing-table supplied by William Linnell in 1752 to Mrs. Elizabeth Montagu for her house in Hill Street, Mayfair, where she was installing her own 'Chinese' room just a short distance from the Beaufort's London house on Grosvenor Street. Mrs. Montagu's commission included a japanned cabinet-on-stand with pierced and applied lattice work, a characteristic feature of the Linnell chinoiserie style. Both the Duke and Mrs. Montagu were following the prevailing fashion for chinoiserie, in fact the latter had written as early as 1749 signaling the arrival of the 'gaudy goût of the Chinese' as a reaction to 'Grecian elegance and symmetry, or Gothic grandeur and magnificence' (A. Oswald, 'Mrs. Montagu and the Chinese Taste', Country Life, 30 April 1953, pp.1328-9).
The present example is closely related to a china cabinet with a similar pierced pagoda top exhibited by Blairman & Sons Ltd. at the Antique Dealers Fair, 1962 (p.25). Another comparable is the Kinross mahogany china cabinet, almost certainly supplied by Alexander Peter, circa 1755-60, to Sir James William Montgomery, 1st Baron Stanhope (d. 1803) and illustrated in P. Macquoid, A History of English Furniture, The Age of Mahogany, volume three, London, 1923, fig. 236 (sold 'The Exceptional Sale 2011', Christie's, London, 7 July 2011, lot 35, £97,250 including premium).