BOSTON, 1760-1780

The design, form and workmanship of this desk exhibit the highest level of furniture production in Chippendale-era Boston. A design favored by Boston's cabinetmakers, the blockfront façade, with its interplay of convex and concave contours, was popular from the 1730s through to the early ninteenth century. The principal mercantile city during this time, well known for its elegance and the fine domestic furnishings of its wealthy merchants, Boston was the center and stylistic disseminator of blockfront furniture production in Colonial America (Margaretta Markle Lovell, "Boston Blockfront Furniture," Boston Furniture of the Eighteenth Century (Boston, 1974), p. 77). Hallmarks of Boston craftsmanship seen on this desk include the corkscrew finials on the interior document drawers, the use of veener strips to cover the drawer divider joints and the angular legs terminating in ball-and-claw feet with raked talons.