This dressing-table is designed in the restrained late 18th Century manner and derived from designs which featured in Thomas Sheraton's, The Cabinet-Maker and Upholsterer's Drawing Book, 1793, plate XX from the Appendix and a design attributed to Thomas Chippendale in The Society of Upholsterer's, Genteel Household Furniture in the Present Taste, 2nd ed., circa 1765, part II, pl. 35. The Blackwell example is rare in having serpentined sides and plain flaps, rather than the more usual deep folding trays to each side and also in having turned stretchers as opposed to a concave-fronted undertier.

Other related examples are one sold from Hackwood Park, Christie's house sale, 20-22 April 1998, lot 406 and another example in harewood sold from The Moller Collection, Sotheby's London, 18 November 1993, lot 119. A further related dressing-table but with cluster-column legs and fretwork sides was sold from the property of D.K.F. Heathcote, Esq., Badlingham Manor, Suffolk, in these Rooms, 11 November 1999, lot 284 (£9,200).