A George III period burr yew-wood and tulipwood crossbanded cylinder desk After a design by Thomas Sheraton
£10,000
Auction: 7 December 2007 at 10:00 GMT
Description
the full width frieze drawer above a cylinder fall enclosing a fitted interior of ogee arched pigeon-holes, flanked by six short drawers above a slide with leathered slope on ratchet adjustment between pen tray and inkwell recesses, the two long graduated drawers with foliate stamped brass oval handles, on square tapering gaitered legs ending in brass socket castors, the whole inlaid with boxwood lines
Dimensions
83.5cm wide, 106cm high, 46.5cm deep
Footnote
Literature: 18th Century Furniture - The Norman Adams Collection, Christopher Claxton Stevens & Stewart Whittington (Antiques Collectors' Club: repr.1989), pp. 128-129, for an almost identical version in amboyna wood. The authors also illustrate further example in yew wood, but with a bookcase top section (ibid., p.215).
Cf. Sheraton's original sketch for this model in his 'Drawing Book', plate 47: ' A Cylinder Desk and Bookcase''. (Re-printed within Ralph Edwards's Dictionary of English Furniture, op. cit., fig. 87, p.161)
Also, compare with a similar yew wood bureau cabinet, with one drawer beneath the cylinder, in Sheraton Furniture, Ralph Fastnedge (1962), pl.74.
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"It is difficult to ascertain, in many instances, the true value of furniture, by those who are strangers to the business. On this account gentlemen often think themselves imposed upon in the high price they must give for a good article."
Thomas Sheraton, The Cabinet Dictionary, 1803, p.117