Lot Essay
The parlour chairs ribbon-fretted vase splat derives in part from a pattern in Thomas Chippendale's The Gentleman and Cabinet-maker's Director, 1754 (pl. 12), and 3rd edn., 1762 (pl. 13). Four chairs of this pattern were bequeathed in 1954 to the Holborne Museum of Art in Bath (see forthcoming publication, The Knight of Glin and James Peill, Irish Furniture, New Haven and London, 2006/7). Another set with the same splat design appears in a photograph of the Drawing-Room at Hoghton Tower, Lancashire (H. A. Tipping, In English Homes, London, 1908, vol. II, p. 118).
A set of six chairs, including two armchairs, of very similar design were offered from the collection of Mrs. Mark Edwin Andrews, Houston, Texas, Sotheby's, New York, 15 April 1994, lot 71. They were acquired in Ireland by Mr. and Mrs. Andrews to furnish Knappogue Castle, built in 1467 by the MacNamara Family and purchased by the Andrews' in 1966. A virtually identical chair was in the collections of the Late Viscount Leverhulme, sold Anderson Galleries, New York, 9-13 February, 1926, lot 47.
A set of six chairs, including two armchairs, of very similar design were offered from the collection of Mrs. Mark Edwin Andrews, Houston, Texas, Sotheby's, New York, 15 April 1994, lot 71. They were acquired in Ireland by Mr. and Mrs. Andrews to furnish Knappogue Castle, built in 1467 by the MacNamara Family and purchased by the Andrews' in 1966. A virtually identical chair was in the collections of the Late Viscount Leverhulme, sold Anderson Galleries, New York, 9-13 February, 1926, lot 47.