A LATE VICTORIAN OAK AND BRASS-MOUNTED HALL STAND

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Turin - London - Corfu THE COLLECTION OF GIORGIO MARSAN AND UMBERTA NASI By Giulia Marsan My parents became collectors almost unintentionally. They grew up in Italy in a period encapsulated in the words of Elena Croce, a time in which: "At the height of the fascist regime the elite stood out in its liberal ivory tower: with tolerant morals and perfect manners, commitment to culture and a love of personality". The fourth child of Tina Agnelli and Carlo Nasi, Mother grew up in an 18th-century Turin palazzo, which had belonged to the family of Massimo D'Azeglio, a painter, writer and Piedmontese Prime Minister. The richly decorated building had been bought in 1919 by Giovanni Agnelli, Mother's grandfather and founder of FIAT, for his daughter and her husband, and was furnished with opulent taste. With her upbringing Mother took for granted that she would live in beautifully furnished grand houses, and Father, whose grandfather was the Secretary of the Accademia Albertina, grew up in a milieu which could not fail to educate his eye, delighted in making this a reality. Mother had an affinity for French culture, but disliked its tendency to pomposity and rhetorical flourish; while Father had a greater empathy with English culture. They both liked neo-classical furniture and 19th-century painting. Father's enthusiasm and evolving taste were tempered by Mother's realism. Most proposed purchases were met with, "Where are you going to put it?" and countered with the ritual response, "I shall find some place". And they did, at Villa Silvio Pellico, a late 18th-century house in the hills of Moncalieri, overlooking the Po Valley. During the Italian economic miracle, buying grand houses and decorating them with antiques was what the affluent did. At the heart of their collection, the Villa Silvio Pellico embodies my parents' unerring eye for quality, and their eclectic, cosmopolitan taste. Their cousins, Gianni and Marella Agnelli, had turned to Russell Page to create an unusual English garden at their Baroque retreat in Villar Perosa; and, in 1956 Mother and Father commissioned the renowned English garden designer to rearrange the gardens of their neo-classical villa. Page created a strongly designed garden with herringbone-pattern brick paths, echoing the English Arts & Crafts movement, and parterres of roses, box-hedges and cypress trees which pay homage to the architecture of classical Italian gardens. In the same way the interiors, in the style first of Tommaso Buzzi and later of Renzo Mongiardino, were decorated with bright trompe l'oeil, fine examples of neo-classical furniture, 19th Century paintings and topographical views by English artists. What a French art expert said of Gianni Agnelli, whose collection was far grander, could equally be applied to Father: "Sa collection est dans la tradition des grands collectionneurs amateurs europíens, parfaitement íclectique, totalment instinctive, sans aucun systímatisme dans le choix des tableaux". Whereas Gianni's collection evolved in a public foundation, Mother and Father never had such a goal. Mother enjoyed 'fairly empty rooms'. Father never had difficulties in selling items to develop other areas of collecting. Driven by their love of beauty and sense of style Mother and Father then bought unique properties in other spectacular locations, including a magnificent apartment in Cadogan Square, and an old Venetian fort on the northern shores of Corfu. With their collection Mother and Father created elegant, graceful but not pretentious environments for a life of beauty and ease, reminiscent of the purposeful and leisured creativity portrayed in Goethe's Wahlverwandschaften.

A LATE VICTORIAN OAK AND BRASS-MOUNTED HALL STAND

CIRCA 1882, ATTRIBUTED TO JAMES SHOOLBRED & CO.

Details

A LATE VICTORIAN OAK AND BRASS-MOUNTED HALL STAND
CIRCA 1882, ATTRIBUTED TO JAMES SHOOLBRED & CO.
The top tier with a baluster gallery, above a solid backplate with urn finials, with a D-shaped stick holder with three divisions, the base with a green painted zinc later drip-tray, on outswept feet, the lower panel with a brass patent diamond, the reverse inscribed in chalk '30'; together with a late Victorian silver mounted ivory handled malacca walking stick, the mounts London, 1900; a gadget walking stick with spirit measuring rule; and three other walking sticks
38½ in. (98 cm.) high; 23 in. (58.5 cm.) wide; 10 in. (25.5 cm.) deep (6)

Special notice

No VAT will be charged on the hammer price, but VAT at 15% will be added to the buyer's premium which is invoiced on a VAT inclusive basis.

Lot Essay

The brass-enriched hall stand, bearing an 1882 patent registration brand, relates to a pattern in the 1880s catalogue of Messrs. Smee & Cobey. The hall stand, with brass and foliate enrichments reflecting the enthusiasm for 'Art Botany' promoted by Christopher Dresser (d.1904), the self styled 'ornamentist', who contributed to Owen Jones's Grammar of Ornament, 1856. The hall stand is closely related to that illustrated in the Trade Catalogue of Messrs. Smeee & Cobey and it is possible that this hall stand was manufactured by them or the London firm of James Shoolbred & Co. They exhibited a very extensive selection of items in the 1878 Paris Universal Exhibition and became one of the first large department stores in London. They expanded from a small draper business and started to manufacture high quality furniture, circa 1870, for which they were given a Royal warrant by the mid-1880s. An almost identical hall stand by Shoolbred was sold anonymously, Christie's, London, 4 March 2004, lot 69.

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