Lot Essay
The 'commode' clothes-press and chest-of-drawers's serpentined tops, with indented 'compass' corners, correspond to that of a 'French Commode Table' engraved in Thomas Chippendale's The Gentleman and Cabinet-Maker's Director', London, 1754 (pl. XLV). These doors are carved with flowered ribbon-guilloches in hollow-cornered panels such as feature in Chippendale's 'Bureau Dressing Table' pattern in the 3rd edition of the Director (pl. LXII), while the acanthus cartouches on the feet relate to those on Chippendale's 'French Commode Table' patern (pl. XLIII).
Thomas Chippendale (d. 1779), of St. Martin's Lane, supplied similar chests-of-drawers on serpentined bracket feet for Wilton House, Wiltshire and Paxton House, Berwickshire around 1770. Such paired items are likely to have been provided for the window-pier of a bedroon apartment and its adjoining dressing-room (C. Gilbert, The Life and Work of Thomas Chippendale, London, 1978, vol. II, p. 117).
Thomas Chippendale (d. 1779), of St. Martin's Lane, supplied similar chests-of-drawers on serpentined bracket feet for Wilton House, Wiltshire and Paxton House, Berwickshire around 1770. Such paired items are likely to have been provided for the window-pier of a bedroon apartment and its adjoining dressing-room (C. Gilbert, The Life and Work of Thomas Chippendale, London, 1978, vol. II, p. 117).