POSSIBLY BY ALEXANDER PETER, CIRCA 1745

THE DESIGN
Magnificent and spaciously proportioned, the appearance and scale of these armchairs was influenced by the extraordinary width of 'fashionable costume' of their time. Beginning in the 1730s and continuing into the following decade, the 'whalebone hoop' adopted by ladies continued to widen, until it was almost impossible to pass through doorways without rotating sideways. Chairs of this form with wide seats and splayed arms were necessary to enable them to sit. The form was useful for men too, whose fashionable coats stretched out wide with flaring skirts, typically stiffened with whalebone (Anon., 'A George II Chair,' Connoisseur, 1966, p. 109).

ALEXANDER PETER
This pair belongs to a set of at least seven other chairs, some of which were originally covered with embroidered scenes from Ovid's Metamorphoses. The set is part of a much larger group of chairs which share a number of constructional idiosyncrasies identified by Lucy Wood in The Upholstered Furniture in the Lady Lever Art Gallery (volume I, Liverpool, 2008, pp. 407-428). Many of the chairs from the larger group have Scottish provenances and also retain their original coverings, thus Lucy Wood explores the possibility that they were made in close liaison with their original needlework panels. One set from the larger group can be attributed to Edinburgh cabinetmaker Alexander Peter (1713-1772), who supplied furniture to the Earl of Dumfries at Dumfries House, while the upholstery was carried out by John Schaw & Co. Thus, based on the shared constructional and situational similarities, the set to which this pair belongs can be provisionally attributed to Alexander Peter (ibid., pp. 427-428).