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Lot Essay
The platform bed, or ta, with its simple and restrained lines, represents one of the very few forms to be preserved in classical Chinese furniture design. By the Ming dynasty, platforms with four legs in various sizes had come into favour replacing earlier box-construction platforms. The present lot has a bold and simple design, with restrained lines and no relief decoration that fashioned from thick pieces of finely grained wood.
Daybeds with hoof feet and without stretchers are exceptionally rare. A citable example is the wooden model mentioned by Wang Zhengshu in his article, ‘Conjectures on Models of Ming-Period Furniture from the Pan Yunzheng Tomb in Shanghai’, Beyond the Screen, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, 1996, pp. 77-83, and illustrated by N. Berliner, op. cit., p. 150, no. 30b. A smaller huanghuali flush-corner leg daybed was sold at Christie’s Hong Kong, 30 November 2020, lot 2808. An important huanghuali daybed, of more robust proportions, and illustrated by G. Ecke in Chinese Domestic Furniture, Rutland, Vermont and Tokyo, 1962, pl. 19, no. 15, was sold at Classical Chinese Furniture from Heveningham Hall; Christie’s Hong Kong, 28 May 2021, lot 2803.
Daybeds with hoof feet and without stretchers are exceptionally rare. A citable example is the wooden model mentioned by Wang Zhengshu in his article, ‘Conjectures on Models of Ming-Period Furniture from the Pan Yunzheng Tomb in Shanghai’, Beyond the Screen, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, 1996, pp. 77-83, and illustrated by N. Berliner, op. cit., p. 150, no. 30b. A smaller huanghuali flush-corner leg daybed was sold at Christie’s Hong Kong, 30 November 2020, lot 2808. An important huanghuali daybed, of more robust proportions, and illustrated by G. Ecke in Chinese Domestic Furniture, Rutland, Vermont and Tokyo, 1962, pl. 19, no. 15, was sold at Classical Chinese Furniture from Heveningham Hall; Christie’s Hong Kong, 28 May 2021, lot 2803.