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Lot Essay
The Franco-Italian character of this brass-inlaid lady's dressing-room cabinet, known as a bonheur-du-jour, reflects the tastes of George, Prince of Wales, later George IV (d. 1830) and his architectural advisors Henry Holland and Charles Heathcote Tatham. This style was popularised by Thomas Sheraton's Cabinet-Maker and Upholsterer's Drawing Books, 1793 and 1802, while the 'Egyptian' star motif on the doors was much favoured by the Prince's upholder George Smith in his Designs for Household Furniture, 1808 and is a feature seen on a set of brass-inlaid calamander quartetto tables by George Oakley.
The cabinet is reputed to have belonged to the Prince's daughter, Princess Charlotte (d. 1817), who, following her marriage to Prince Leopold of Saxe-Saalfeld, lived at Claremont House, Esher, Surrey, which had been built by Holland in collaboration with Lancelot Brown in the 1770s for Clive of India. It is most likely to have been supplied by the Mount Street firm of Tatham, Bailey & Saunders, which supplied rosewood furniture with gilt enrichments to the Prince of Wales in 1814 and was one of the most important cabinet-making firms of the period.
The Princess owned a number of pieces of brass-inlaid furniture, some of which were included in Messrs. Puttick & Simpson's sale of the contents of Claremont, 25-28 October 1926. Other similar Regency pieces were sold at Christie's London, 16 July 1981, lots 158, 159, 171, 172, 174, and 177; they had passed by descent to H.R.H. Princess Alice, Countess of Athlone from her parents the Duke and Duchess of Albany who had lived at Claremont from 1882 to 1922.
The cabinet was loaned to Brighton Pavilion for the 1950 Centenary Exhibition, which celebrated the anniversary of the town acquiring guardianship of the Royal Pavilion, thus saving it from the threat of demolition. Prior to this, however, in 1847-8 the interiors were stripped of their furnishings until the idea of the Regency Exhibition was mounted in 1946 for which items with Brighton Pavilion provenance were loaned from the Royal Collection, alongside other fitting Regency pieces from various private collections, in order to recreate the atmosphere of the interiors.
The cabinet is reputed to have belonged to the Prince's daughter, Princess Charlotte (d. 1817), who, following her marriage to Prince Leopold of Saxe-Saalfeld, lived at Claremont House, Esher, Surrey, which had been built by Holland in collaboration with Lancelot Brown in the 1770s for Clive of India. It is most likely to have been supplied by the Mount Street firm of Tatham, Bailey & Saunders, which supplied rosewood furniture with gilt enrichments to the Prince of Wales in 1814 and was one of the most important cabinet-making firms of the period.
The Princess owned a number of pieces of brass-inlaid furniture, some of which were included in Messrs. Puttick & Simpson's sale of the contents of Claremont, 25-28 October 1926. Other similar Regency pieces were sold at Christie's London, 16 July 1981, lots 158, 159, 171, 172, 174, and 177; they had passed by descent to H.R.H. Princess Alice, Countess of Athlone from her parents the Duke and Duchess of Albany who had lived at Claremont from 1882 to 1922.
The cabinet was loaned to Brighton Pavilion for the 1950 Centenary Exhibition, which celebrated the anniversary of the town acquiring guardianship of the Royal Pavilion, thus saving it from the threat of demolition. Prior to this, however, in 1847-8 the interiors were stripped of their furnishings until the idea of the Regency Exhibition was mounted in 1946 for which items with Brighton Pavilion provenance were loaned from the Royal Collection, alongside other fitting Regency pieces from various private collections, in order to recreate the atmosphere of the interiors.