A REGENCY MAHOGANY 'IMPERIAL' EXTENDING DINING-TABLE

ATTRIBUTED TO GILLOWS, EARLY 19TH CENTURY

Details

A REGENCY MAHOGANY 'IMPERIAL' EXTENDING DINING-TABLE
ATTRIBUTED TO GILLOWS, EARLY 19TH CENTURY
The rounded rectangular top with a reeded edge and four additional leaves, on tapering turned and reeded legs with brass caps and castors, labelled 'The ROYAL AERO CLUB AVIATION CENTRE / Londonderry House, 19 Park Lane, LONDON, W.1 / J.J.W. Salmon Esq.,' and with a depository label inscribed in pencil 'Salmond / 80' the leaves housed in the original mahogany standing case
28 ½ in. (73 cm.) high; 62 in. (158 cm.) wide; 150 in. (381 cm.) extended

Provenance

Almost certainly supplied to Peter, 5th Earl Cowper (d.1836), Panshanger, Hertfordshire, and thence by descent to
Ethel, Lady Desborough (d.1952) and thence by descent until sold
Christie's, London, 7 July 1994, lot 65

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Lot Essay

In 1804 Gillows illustrated and patented their 'Imperial' dining-table in which a variable number of loose leaves were fitted between fixed end leaves, a design which, within a few years, largely superceded most earlier ones. Initially such tables had an arrangement of as many as ten or twelve legs to support the central leaves when extended, but as the design was improved and the mechanism became more sturdy the centre legs were gradually removed. The form remained popular and another drawing of an improved version of the table by Ferguson & Co, one of the successors to the Gillow family business, is dated as late as 1849 (see Susan E. Stuart, Gillows of Lancaster and London 1730-1840, Woodbridge, 2008, vol.I, pp.243-246.

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