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Lot Essay
These monumental sofas, en suite with the armchairs offered here (lot 34), were most probably supplied around 1740 to Humphrey Sturt (d.1786), or possibly his father, also Humphrey, for Horton, Dorset, the family's country house since 1718, before being removed to Crichel after 1765, where they were later recorded in the East Hall in an inventory of 1866.
The sofas' unusual high-armed design and construction is based upon that of couches and large stools with scrolled ends, which became fashionable in the 1730s. The scrolled sides are joined into the side seat-rails in the same way that a chair back is conventionally joined into the back seat-rail, and the sofa's back is then simply joined onto the rear facing uprights (rather than being joined into the back rail). The technique is the same as would have been employed for the couch with a single scrolled end at Beningborough, Yorkshire, of circa 1730 - 45, and for the large stool with double scrolled ends at Longford Castle, Wiltshire of circa 1740, both illustrated in Adam Bowett, Early Georgian Furniture 1715 - 1740, Woodbridge, 2009, p.187, pl. 46.8 and p.185, pl. 4.83.
The sofas' unusual high-armed design and construction is based upon that of couches and large stools with scrolled ends, which became fashionable in the 1730s. The scrolled sides are joined into the side seat-rails in the same way that a chair back is conventionally joined into the back seat-rail, and the sofa's back is then simply joined onto the rear facing uprights (rather than being joined into the back rail). The technique is the same as would have been employed for the couch with a single scrolled end at Beningborough, Yorkshire, of circa 1730 - 45, and for the large stool with double scrolled ends at Longford Castle, Wiltshire of circa 1740, both illustrated in Adam Bowett, Early Georgian Furniture 1715 - 1740, Woodbridge, 2009, p.187, pl. 46.8 and p.185, pl. 4.83.