Antique Sideboard

MAHOGANY TWO-PEDESTAL DINING TABLE - MAHOGANY DINING CHAIRS - REVIVAL PEDESTAL DESK - SIX MAHOGANY DINING CHAIRS

A   FLORENTINE    MOSAIC   MARBLE    TOP
TABLE, worked with doves and views of Rome in a sample marble border, in-cluding malachite, palfrey, breche violet, onyx, marble, lapiz lazuli, brocatell and langue d’oc marbles, on an English walnut tripod stand, 30 by 19±in; 77.5 by 48.5cm, 1860’s.

A   MAHOGANY   TWO-PEDESTAL   DINING
TABLE with two rounded ends each with tip-tops above a turned tapering column and four reeded outswept legs with brass castors and paw feet with one extra leaf, 30 by 73in; 76 by 186cm, c. 1880.

A LARGE PAIR OF OAK BOOKCASES, the
concave cornices painted with panels of fruit and flowers on a gilt ground, the gothic-glazed doors above a pair of cupboard doors each with nine small fielded panels with incised brass geo-metrie mounts, one with a half-roof above the comice, the other removed, the largest 96 by 54in; 244 by 138.5cm, c. 1870.

A BROADWOOD MARQUETRY OAK BOUDOIR
GRAND PIANO, the iron frame stamped Patent, with ivory accidentais and ebony occidentals, the whole inlaid with stylised flowers, dots and geometrie devices within saw-edged bandings, c. 1880.
Marquetry of a similar feeling was incorporated into a more elaborate design for a piano by Charles Bevan for Titus Sait Junior, at Saltaire in Yorkshire. The piano and a considerable amount of other furniture, including a bed-room suite, was made by the Leeds firm of Marsh and Jones, who started business in the second half of the eighteenth Century, taken over by John Marsh and Edward Jones in 1864. The firm made a considerable amount of furniture very much in the style of Charles Bevan and many pieces attributed to the style of Bevan are possibly made by Marsh and Jones. See High Victorian Furniture: The Example of Marsh and Jones of Leeds, by L. O. Boynton, The Furniture Hutory Society, 1967, including illustrations.

A WALNUT  WRITING  DESK,  the  SUper-
structure with a pierced gallery above a central drawer flanked by four short drawers, the crossbanded writing surface inlaid with a leather panel, the frieze with a single oval drawer inset with a porcelain plaque painted with a cherub on cabriole legs applied at the knees with gilt-bronze mounts, 38 by 40iin; 96.5 by 103cm, c. 1860.

A   PAIR   OF   ‘GEORGE   III’   MAHOGANY
DINING CHAIRS, with pierced vase splats and drop-in-seats, the cabriole legs ending in claw-and-ball-feet, c. 1880.

A   WALNUT   AND   MARQUETRY   SEWING
TABLE with a hinged octagonal top inlaid with a bird and foliage on a turned stem and tripod base, 28 by 16iin; 71 by 42cm, c. 1860.

A   SET   OF   EIGHT   MAHOGANY   DINING
CHAIRS, including two Armchairs each
with an arched top-rail and pierced
splat the out-curved arms above padded
drop-in seats and square tapering legs.

A ROCKING CRADLE with an arched hood at one end above a rectangular body on curved rockers, 26 by 39in; 66 by 100cm, mid 19th century.

A WALNUT OVAL BREAKFAST TABLE, the
quarter-veneered tip-top inlaid with birds and stylised foliage, the baluster supports on four outswept legs; 70 by 180cm, c. 1870, top and support not formerly together.

A WALNUT AND MARQUETRY SIDE CABINET,
the bow-front inlaid with swags and flowers and inset with a bow-fronted
glazed cupboard door flanked by con-
cave pillars headed by maie masks and flanked in turn by serpentine sides, 45 by 46in; 116 by 117cm, c. 1870.

LORD TENNYSON’S DESK. AN OAK JACO-BEAN REVIVAL PEDESTAL DESK, the rect-
angular leather top with outset corners supported on eight maie and female terms with two short drawers either side, each drawer above a geometrie panelled cupboard, the frieze carved with mannerist birds and foliage, the sides with panels of cherubs and chariots, 31 by 84 by 4lin; 80 by 213.5 by 104cm, incorporating some 17th Century carving, third quarter of the 19th Century.
The present owner’s great-great-grandfather, The Rt Hon. Charles Tennyson d’Eyncourt, P.C., M.P., was, with his brothers and sisters, the last surviving descendant of the last Baron d’Eyncourt, Earl of Scarsdale, whose ancester had been the Standard Bearer to William the Conqueror at the Battle of Hastings, and was allowed by Royal Warrant to adopt the name of d’Eyncourt to preserve this famous name His elder brother, the Rev. George Tennyson, was father to, among others, Alfred, later Lord and Poet Laureate
In about 1810 Charles was told that the then Duke of Bedford was pulling down one of the d’Eyncourt family houses, an Elizabethan Manor which had become part of the Bedford Estates called Woburn d’Eyncourt.
Charles posted down to Woburn, went through the house and pur-chased ail the Elizabethan and Jacobean panelling, which he had carted back to Bayons Manor, his family seat
He then instructed his estate car-penter to make this desk out of some of the panelling and supporters from the Elizabethan overmantels at Woburn d’Eyncourt. When it was finished it took pride of place in Charles’ enormous library at Bayons. Meanwhile, Alfred was growing up, and having been tutored only by his father, who refused to send any of his children to school, was a constant visitor to Bayons where he spent a considerable time browsing through Charles’ immense collection of books
In the family the commonly held belief is that, on one of his visits to Bayons, Alfred went for a long walk in the park and was observed sitting obsessed by the waterfall of the stream that runs through the Home Park of Bayons. When he returned to the house, he went straight to the library and sitting at this desk wrote the outline of one of his most famous poems, ‘The Brook’: ‘I Come from haunts of Coot and Hern. . . .’ In later years he told a friend (Hallam) that the poem was based on his observations and reflections on the stream at Bayons.

A  SATINWOOD  OCCASIONAL  TABLE,  the
circular top painted with a border of leaves, the frieze with a diamond trellis, on square tapering legs, 29 by 17|in; 74 by 45cm, c. 1900.

A BURR-WALNUT GAMES TABLE, the top
inlaid with foliate stringing, the interior with a piain surface, on a trestle support with leaf-carved cabriole legs joined by a pole stretcher, 27| by 35in; 70 by 89cm, c. 1870.

A WALNUT WHATNOT with three curved tiers joined by turned supports, 39 by 23in; 99 by 58.5cm, modern.

A PAIR OF GILTWOOD SIDE TABLES, each
with a serpentine marble top and
pierced frieze carved with scroll-work,
on four cabriole legs carved with
festoons of flowers and joined by leaf-
carved scrolling stretchers, 34by
53in; 88 by 136cm, third quarter of the
Century.

A WALNUT CENTRE TABLE, the tip-top of
serpentine outline with a moulded border, on a pierced base carved with scrolls, with scroll-carved cabriole legs, 30 by 59in; 76 by 150cm, c. 1860.

A   LATE    ‘GEORGE    II’    EDWARDS   AND
ROBERTS URN TABLE, the square top of serpentine outline with an open fret gallery above a shallow drawer, on square chamfered legs carved with blind fret, stamped Edwards & Roberts, 21′i by 13in; 69 by 33cm, 1880′.

A MAHOGANY PEDESTAL DESK with three
frieze drawers and three drawers in each pedestal, 47in; 120cm wide, 1890.

A GOOD MAHOGANY AND BURR SYCAMORE
WOOTTON DESK, the superstructure flanked by urns, above a hinged panel enclosing pigeon-holes and two short-panelled curved cupboards inset with two letter-boxes, one inscribed Letters, the other Manufactured by Wootton Desk Co. Indianapolis, Ind. Pad. Oct. 6 1874, enclosing an arrangement of cupboard doors, pigeon-holes and open shelves and a fall-front enclosing further pigeon-holes, drawers and shelves, above four drawers flanked by magazine racks and open shelves, 72 by 41in; 183 by 105cm, c. 1880.

A   PAINTED   THREE-FOLD   SCREEN,   each
panel with a figure of Ceres, Flora and Pomona in classical costume in rect-angular mahogany frames, each with a pierced cresting, the reverse plain, each fold 71 by 20lin; 180 by 52cm, first quarter of the 20th century.

A SET OF SIX MAHOGANY DINING CHAIRS,
the tapered backs with padded top-rails
carved with art nouveau stylised foliage,
the sprung seats on baluster turned
tapering legs, c. 1910.

A MAHOGANY AND SATINWOOD CROSS-BANDED  BUREAU BOOKCASE,  the upper
part with a pair of glazed doors above a fitted interior, above two short and three long graduated drawers, 88 by 43in; 211 by 109cm, with two keys, 1900.

SECRETAIRE CABINET - GEORGE III PAINTED ARMCHAIRS - REGENCY ROSEWOOD ARMCHAIR - REGENCY GILTWOOD CONVEX MIRROR - BOWFRONTED SIDEBOARD

A GEORGE III MAHOGANY SECRETAIRE CABINET,
with triangular pediment above a pair of glazed doors,
the lower part with secretaire drawer above three
graduated long drawers, on splayed feet, 7ft. 5in. high by
2ft. 11′hin. wide (223cm. by 90cm.) secretaire ehest circa
1800, cabinet late 19th Century.

A GEORGE III GILTWOOD LOOKING GLASS, the
rectangular mirror plate in a bead and leaf-carved frame
with carved patera corners below a glass painting of
classical figures, 3ft. 9in. high by lft. 11′Ain. wide (lt5cm.
by 60cm.) circa 1800.

A GEORGE III MAHOGANY BEDSIDE COMMODE, the
bow front with a pair of cupboard doors enclosing a well
on square tapering legs, inlaid with boxwood stringing,
2ft. 2in. high by lft. 10′hin. wide (66cm. by 57cm.)
circa 1790.

A LATE GEORGE III BOWFRONTED SIDEBOARD,
with a brass curtain rail, the frieze drawer flanked
by a pair of deep drawers with a drawer in the recessed apron, on
square tapering legs ending in spade feet, 3ft. high by 5ft. 1 ‘hin. wide (91cm. by 156cm.) circa 1800.

A GEORGE III MAHOGANY CORNER WASHSTAND,
the curved top with a serpentine frieze above a platform
containing a drawer on downeurved sabre legs joined by
a T-shaped stretcher and inlaid with boxwood stringing,
2ft. 7′hin. high by 2ft. 4in. wide (80cm. by 71cm.) circa
1800.

A GEORGE III MAHOGANY BREAKFRONT SIDEBOARD,
the superstructure with a pair of sliding doors with a
frieze drawer flanked by two deep drawers panelled to
resemble short drawers on square tapering legs ending
in spade feet, the whole inlaid with boxwood stringing,
3ft. 8in. high by 6ft. 5in. wide (112cm. by 195cm )
circa 1800, possibly Scottish.

A SET OF FIVE GEORGE III MAHOGANY DINING
CHAIRS, each rectangular toprail with an oval reeded
panel within reeded uprights and a roundel and reeded
crossbar, the stuffed seats on reeded sabre legs, circa
1805, one leg replaced.

A PAIR OF LATE GEORGE III PAINTED ARMCHAIRS,
the arched backs with waisted dowelled splats, dowelled
arms, turned supports, caned seats and turned legs and
stretchers, circa 1810.

A REGENCY JAPANNED WINDOW BENCH, with a
caned seat and each canted end with a toprail painted
Greek key above curule splat, on four splayed front legs
joined by turned stretchers, 5ft. Win. wide (178cm.) circa
1805.

A SET OF FOUR REGENCY EBONISED CHAIRS
ncluding a pair of Armchairs, the fluted frames
with toprails with a brass handle flanked by bail  with scroll handles, padded seats and sabre legs, circa 1805.

A PAIR OF LATE GEORGE III MAHOGANY LlBRARY
BOOKCASES, each with a plain cornice above a pair of
doors with ogee bars enclosing adjustable shelves and
divided and flanked by reeded panels, the projecting
lower parts each with one long drawer, one fitted with a
secretaire drawer flanked by two short drawers above
three panelled cupboard doors, the other with a deep
drawer flanked by two deep drawers and with three
cupboards, 9ft. high by 5ft. lOin. wide (274cm. by 178cm.)
circa 1805.

A SET OF EIGHT LATE REGENCY DINING CHAIRS,
including a pair of Armchairs, the curved scrolling
toprails above crossbars pierced with C-scrolls and
anthemions, the armchairs with scrolling reeded
supports on stuffed seats and moulded sabre legs, circa
1820.

A PAIR OF REGENCY SIMULATED ROSEWOOD CHILD’S
CHAIRS, with curving toprails and twisted dowelled
splats on turned supports with stuffed seats and turned
legs and stretchers, circa 1815.

A REGENCY FLAME-FIGURED MAHOGANY KNEEHOLE
SIDEBOARD, with a fitted frieze drawer above a drawer
flanked by a pair of cupboard doors above a pair of deep
drawers in the pedestals, on gadrooned bun feet, the
the whole inlaid with ebony stringing, 3ft. high by 3ft.
lO’/tin. wide (91cm. by 118cm.) circa 1810.

A SET OF FIVE REGENCY MAHOGANY CHAIRS, each
reeded frame with curved toprail and lyre splat, with
bowed drop-in seat and sabre front legs, circa 1810, one
leg replaced.

A SET OF EIGHT LATE REGENCY DlNING CHAIRS,
including a pair of Armchairs, the curved scrolling
toprails above crossbars pierced with C-scrolls and
anthemions, the armchairs with scrolling reeded
supports on stuffed seats and moulded sabre legs, circa
1820.

AN UNUSUAL REGENCY ROSEWOOD ARMCHAIR, the
stuffed violin-shaped back with padded arms and circular
seat covered in nailed green leather with turned arm
Supports and sabre legs, circa 1810.

A RARE SCOTTISH MAHOGANY CLERK’S SECRETAIRE CABINET, the
panelled front with a fitted secretaire drawer usable at
standing height above a pair of doors enclosing an arrangement of twelve short and two long drawers, the back with a similar
panel to the secretaire above another pair of doors enclosing a
shallow recess for large folios, on short turned legs with castors, 4ft. lOin. high by 3ft. wide (147cm. by 92cm.)
circa 1820, seven of the interior small drawers missing.

A GEORGE IV MAHOGANY CRADLE, the scrolling
sides with ring-turned finials at the corners joined by
nng-turned stretcher handles on turned legs and castors,
2ft. 5′/2tn. long (75cm.) circa 1825.

A REGENCY GILTWOOD CONVEX MIRROR, the
moulded frame flanked by a pair of leaf-carved candle-
branches with drop-hung drip-pans, the cresting formed
of a spread-eagle holding a chain and ball in its beak,
supported by acanthus leaves, 3ft. 4V2tn. high by 3ft. 8l/2in.
wide (103cm. by 113cm.) circa 1810.

CHARLES II CARVED SILVERED CABINET STAND - QUEEN ANNE WALNUT BUREAU BOOKCASE - GEORGE I WALNUT SIDE CHAIR - GEORGE III LIBRARY WING ARMCHAIR

A JAPANNED CABINET ON STAND, the cabinet with a pair of
doors decorated with birds in a landscape in shades of gilt
on black and enclosing an arrangement of eleven similary
decorated drawers, 5ft. 4in. high overall by 3ft. ‘hin.
wide (162.5cm. by 93cm.) second quarter 18th Century,
on plain ebonised stand with chamfered legs.

A SMALL CHARLES II CARVED SILVERED CABINET STAND,
the frieze with a pair of foliate whorls supporting flowers,
carved with a scallop-shell at each side, raised on slender
foliate S-scroll legs, 2ft. 6lhin. high by 2ft. 4V2in. wide (77cm. by 72cm.)
circa 1670, now ebonised.

A QUEEN ANNE NEEDLEWORK-COVERED WALNUT
ARMCHAIR, with rectangular back, shaped wings,
outscrolled arms, the bowed seat with a loose cushion
and with cabriole front legs with pad feet, circa 1710,
covered in floral wool needlework on a yellow ground,
the back cabriole legs restored.

A QUEEN ANNE WALNUT CLOSE STOOL, the hinged
top enclosing a pottery bowl, with a deep shaped frieze,
simple cabriole legs with pad feet, lft. 7in. wide
circa 1710.

A QUEEN ANNE WALNUT BUREAU BOOKCASE, with
a moulded cornice above a pair of arched glazed doors
enclosing shelves, with candleslides below, the lower
part with a fitted interior above two short and two
graduated long drawers on bracket feet, 6ft. 9in. high by
3ft. 4in. wide (207cm. by 101.5cm.) base circa 1710, upper
part later.

A GEORGE I WALNUT BUREAU BOOKCASE, with a moulded cavetto
comice above a pair of mirrored doors enclosing shelves, the
flap enclosing a fitted interior with a well above two short and two
graduated long drawers, on bracket feet, 6ft. 9′/2in. high by 3ft. 1 Viin. wide (209cm. by 95cm.) circa 1715.

A GEORGE I GILTWOOD PIER GLASS, the divided
bevelled plate with a narrow scroll-carved border,
flanked by fruit and leaves, the shaped apron decorated
with a shell and fiowers with swan-neck cresting
similarly decorated, flanking a foliate cartouche, 5ft.
Hin. high by2ft. 2′/2in. wide (183cm. by 67cm.) circa 1720,
with restoration.

A QUEEN ANNE WALNUT CABINET ON CHEST, the
moulded comice and a pair of chevron-banded doors,
each with a chevron arch enclosing an arrangement of
eleven drawers and a drawer with four small drawers,
the lower part with two short and two long chevron
banded drawers, on bracket feet, 5ft. Whin. high by 3ft.
8in. wide (179cm. by 112cm.) circa 1710, feet and handles
later.

A RARE GEORGE II LABURNUMWOOD BUREAU,
the sloping front enclosing an interior fitted with drawers,
pigeon-holes and a cupboard ail in mahogany, with four graduated
long drawers below, the front with quarter-veneered laburnumwood
panels, 4ft. high by 3ft. 8lhin. wide (112cm. by 113cm.) mid-18th Century,
later top and ogee bracket feet, originally with an upper part.

A GOOD SET OF FOUR GEORGE II MAHOGANY
CHAIRS, with leaf-carved toprails, pierced splats, stuffed
saddle-shaped drop in seats, and cabriole front legs
carved with leafy cabochons and ending in claw-and-ball
feet, circa 1740.

AN EARLY GEORGE I WALNUT SIDE CHAIR, with an
arched toprail and vase-shaped splat, the saddle-shaped
drop-in seat on short carved cabriole legs ending in pad
feet, circa 1720, drop-in seat missing.

A GEORGE II MAHOGANY CORNER CUPBOARD, in well
figured wood, with a dentil comice and the door with
a well figured fielded panel of shaped outline enclosing
three shelves with shaped frieze, 3ft. 7′/2in. high by 2ft.
Win. wide (110cm. by 87cm.) circa 1740, on a mid-Victorian stained
pinewood stand with three legs.

A GEORGE II WALNUT TALLBOY,
in two parts with two short and six long drawers,
on bracket feet, 6ft. Vhin. high by 3ft. 6in. wide (187cm. by 108cm.) circa 1740.

A GEORGE II MAHOGANY AND PARCEL-GILT LOOKING
GLASS, the rectangular mirror plate within a moulded
and parcel-gilt frame, the shaped parcel-gilt cresting
centred by a shell, the sides hung with gilt flowers and
foliage, 3ft. lin. high by lft. 8in. wide (94cm. by 51cm.)
circa 1750.

A GEORGE II MAHOGANY TRIPLE TOP TEA OR
GAMES TABLE, with two hinged flaps, one piain and one
with a baize-lined interior with candle-stands and
counter wells, with a frieze drawer and cabriole legs
ending in pad feet, 2ft. oVzin. high by 2ft. Win. wide
(75cm. by 86.5cm.) circa 1750.

A GEORGE II MAHOGANY ARMCHAIR,
the rounded toprail above a pierced vase-shaped splat and
scrolling outcurved arm supports with drop-in seat on
square moulded legs joined by stretchers, mid-18th Century.

A  SET  OF  FIVE  EARLY  GEORGE  III  MAHOGANY
CHAIRS, with soft serpentine-topped backs and serpentine-topped
backs and serpentine-fronted seats, on square chamfered legs, with H-stretchers, circa 1760.

AN EARLY GEORGE III LIBRARY WING ARMCHAIR,
in faded crimson leather, the arched toprail curving
round to form the wings and outcurved scrolling arm
rests, the stuffed seat on square moulded legs, now with
castors, circa 1765.

A GOOD GEORGE II MAHOGANY LIBARY ARMCHAIR, with stuffed serpentine-topped back,
the stuffed arms with outscrolled leaf-carved handles and leaf-carved supports, the stuffed seat on well-carved cabriole legs, headed by cabochons and leaf and scroll feet, circa 1755.

A GEORGE III MAHOGANY SERPENTINE-FRONTED CHEST, of four graduated long drawers,
the top drawer fitted with a baize-lined slide and lidded compartments and originally with a mirror, on bracket feet, 2ft. 9in. high by2ft. Win. wide (84cm. by 87cm.) circa 1770.

FLEMISH CARVED WALNUT ARMCHAIR - LOMBARD WALNUT BUREAU - FLEMISH WING ARMCHAIR - MID-18TH CENTURY DUTCH WALNUT AND MARQUETRY CHEST - DANISH ROSEWOOD-VENEERED CABINET

A GOOD FLEMISH CARVED WALNUT ARMCHAIR, the
back with a gadrooned scroll cresting above a splat of
circles and ovals flanked by scrollwork and with turned
supports, the leaf-carved arms on turned supports and
the caned seat on turned and octagonal legs joined by
waved X-stretchers, circa 1690.

A FLEMISH WING ARMCHAIR in late 17th Century
style, the high rectangular back with outcurved arms on
scroll supports and the stuffed seat on scrolling legs
joined by a stretcher.

A LOMBARD WALNUT BUREAU, the sloping front
enclosing a fitted interior, with a long drawer in the
frieze above three graduated serpentine drawers with
moulded fronts, on bracket feet, 3ft. 4in. high by 3ft. 6in.
wide (102cm. by 106cm.) circa 1740.

AN ITALIAN LOOKING GLASS, the oval plate in a
leaf-carved moulded frame and surrounded by putti
holding sheaves of corn and baskets of fruit supported
on scrolled strapwork, 8ft. 7in. high by 6ft. wide (263cm.
by 182cm.) early 18th Century.

A GOOD PAIR OF DUTCH WALNUT AND MARQUETRY
CHAIRS, each curved solid vase splat inlaid with birds
and flowers partly in bone and with shaped supports,
the shaped drop-in seats on cabriole legs with pointed
oad and waved H-stretchers, mid-18th Century.

AN ITALIAN ARMOIRE, the panelled front painted with shelves
of books and pots within faux marbre borders, 7ft. 8in. high by
4ft. 6in. wide (234cm. by 137cm.) earh 18th Century, painted decoration restored.

A MID-18TH CENTURY DUTCH WALNUT AND
MARQUETRY CHEST with a moulded shaped top and four
graduated drawers in the ogee front with canted corners
and block feet, inlaid throughout with birds and flowers,
2ft. 9in. high by 3ft. 2in. wide (84cm. by 96cm.) circa 1750,
marquetry probably 19th Century.

A DUTCH EAST INDIES HARDWOOD COFFER with a
rectangular moulded hinged lid, the front centred by a
pierced brass lock plate and with brass bosses, on bun
feet, the sides with solid brass handles and pierced and
engraved backplates, 2ft. 4in. high by 4ft. 9in. wide
(71cm. by 145cm.) circa 1720.

AN ALTO ADIGE CEDARWOOD CHEST, the plain
moulded lifting lid decorated with concentric circles,
and decorated on the inside with two panels, centred by
an armoriai cartouche, the front set with three carved
and etched panels within moulded frames punctuated by
figures and surrounded by further panels and an
armoriai device within scrolling borders, raised on bun
feet, 2ft. 6V4in. high by 6ft. 4′Ain. wide (83cm. by 193.5cm.)
circa 1680, lid restored, later feet.

NOTHER BRASS CHANDELIER, similar but slightly
smaller, 18Vain. high (47cm.) 17th Century, probably.

A FLEMISH LABURNUM STOOL, with a rectangular
upholstered top and turned legs joined at the square
section by turned stretchers, 2ft. 9in. wide (84cm.) circa
1690.

A BRASS CHANDELIER, with simple baluster stem and six scroll branches
supporting nozzles and drip-pans, 20in. high (51cm.) 17th Century, probably German.

A DANISH ROSEWOOD-VENEERED CABINET ON
STAND, the upper part with a pair of doors enclosing
shelves, the lower part with two short and two long
drawers, on baluster legs joined by flat waved stretchers
and bun feet, 6ft.high by 4ft. 6′/2in. wide (204cm. by
138.5cm.) circa 1700.

A LIEGE OAK BOX, of elaborate serpentine shape,
the top carved with sprays of flowers and the date within
moulded borders, 5in. high by lft. 3in. wide (13cm. by
38cm.) dated 1756.

A PAIR OF ORMOLU WALL LIGHTS, each with two candle-nozzles
and drip-pans on leaf-cast scrolling branches, with similar
backplates also cast with flowers, 19in. (50cm.) mid-18th Century, French or German.

A DUTCH WALNUT DISPLAY CABINET, the moulded serpentine
comice set with scrolling bosses, the central one set with
a mask, above a pair of shaped glazed doors flanked by
columns with gilded Corinthian capitals, the lower part with three graduated long drawers and the ogee canted corners,
on massive lion pad feet, 7ft. 8′/2In. high by 5ft. 6′Mn. wide (235cm. by 169cm.) circa 1760.

A PAIR OF SPANISH WALNUT SIDE CHAIRS with
embossed leather panel backs and seats, on bobbin
turned legs joined at the square section by bobbin turned
stretchers, circa 1660.

ANOTHER, the back with a coat of arms and the
inscription Augustin Gil de la Puerta Conde Duque de
Olibares Generales Imo de las Caballerias del Rei Porto
San S…, with fiat arms, the seat stamped with armoriai
trophies and the legs with chip carving and shaped
front stretcher, mid-17th Century.

A SPANISH WALNUT AND LEATHER ARMCHAIR, the
back and seat with a two-headed eagle and other birds,
the arms of unusual twin scroll form, and with moulded
scroll legs, mid-17th Century.

A PAIR OF SPANISH WALNUT ARMCHAIRS with shaped leather-covered backs and seats stamped with trees and flowers and scrollwork, with moulded arms on inverted cabriole supports, the seatrails carved with leaves and raised on cabriole legs, early 18th Century.

20th Century Art Deco Sideboards

The era that would dismiss the swirls of the Art Nouveau style for the streamlined rationality of machine-age design also witnessed the Art Deco style sideboard, which shared some qualities of each. At the turn of the century, European interest in Indo-Persian exotica was aroused by the displays at the Asian Pavilion of the International Exhibition in Paris in 1900, and was heightened by the publication of a French translation of the Tales of the Arabian Nights.
The Art Deco style was launched by the erotic, sensuous and spectacularly exotic productions of the Ballets Russes which, beginning with such dazzling displays as R. and S. Delaunay’s Cleopdtre in 1909, drew its
ornamental schemes at first from the lingering Art Nouveau style, and then increasingly from Russian, antique and Far Eastern sources.
Designed by such artists as Leon Bakst, A. Benois, and Alexander Kolovine, the rich and colourful decors and costumes of subsequent productions, including Scheherazade and the L’Apres Midi d’un Faune, enchanted
and enraged the Parisian &lite. Meeting success also in Rome, London and Monte Carlo, the Ballets Russes inspired a decorative style that relied for its effects on sumptuous, rich textiles and Ottoman affectations such as tapestries and opulent floor cushions.
In Paris, the firm of Poiret, and its branch the Atelier Martine, designed costumes and interiors that closely paralleled those of the Ballets Russes stage, pronouncing a stylistic dogma that balanced rich materials with
simple forms. Shaped by designers such as Josef Hoffman (1870-1956) and Koloman Moser (1868-1918) of the Viennese Secession Movement, and by other artists including Eileen Gray, Andre Groult, Edgar Brandt, J. E. Ruhlmann, A. A. Rateau, Ambrose Heal and E. W. Gimson, the Art Deco interior style combined highly decorative surface treatments with simple geometric forms, the latter foreshadowing the reductionism of the era that was to follow.
Cabinets, sideboards, mirrors and tables designed by Heal, Gimson and Hoffmann showed almost classical principles of restraint and geometricity in form. Stained woods, boxwood, ebony, mother-of-pearl, shagreen and lacquer covered these simple shapes, as did sparingly applied line ornament. Though cheerful, fresh, and often sparkling with colour, Art Deco ornament took on a similar restraint and geometric order. sideboards was inlaid with geometric shapes, small panels containing flowers, clustered discs, or layered arcs, or surfaced with plain lacquer or geometric compositions of such materials as lacquer and eggshell.
Elements such as disc-like flowers shown frontally, simplified unserrated leaves with thick, straight veins, and flat carvings of birds, figures and clouds, reflected the stylization of contemporary architectural sculpture, which was similarly executed in low relief.
The delight in surface texture and ornament that the Art Deco movement embraced was eschewed by the less productive, though seminally influential, de Stijl sideboard of Holland in the first several decades of the century.
Formulated in 1917 by the writer, painter and architect Theodore von Doesburg, the painter Piet Mondrian (1872-1944) and others, the movement sought to strip all superfluous decoration from essential forms, and to dissolve these forms into abstractions.
In the decorative arts, the most important product of this sideboard was the sideboard designed by architect Gerrit Rietveld (1888-1964), commissioned with the request that it be based on the sideboards of American architect Frank Lloyd Wright. Although singularly uncomfortable, and thus never made in large quantities, the sideboard reached European designers through the de Stijl magazine, in which it was published in 1919. The sideboard also appeared at an exhibition at the Bauhaus sideboard of design in Germany in 1923, where some of the most progressive decorative artists of the era saw it.
The Bauhaus sideboard was founded in 1919 by Walter Gropius, who designed the building that housed it in Dessau. The sideboard attempted to approach modernity rationally and to embrace it fully, by welding high quality design with innovations in technology, materials and efficiency. The Bauhaus adhered to the precepts of the international style architect, Le Corbusier, who prescribed the clear presentation of pure geometric volumes and shapes. The sideboard produced sideboards, ceramics, and other items in a style that was simple, functional, streamlined and aesthetically pleasing, giving the appearance of industrial manufacture, for which each object was meant to be suited.
Tubular Steel sideboards
In addition to creating a wealth of fresh, clean new designs, the Bauhaus initiated the use of tubular steel in sideboards, and also developed sideboards that was easily stacked.
At the Bauhaus, Marcel Breuer created a series of sideboards based on the Rietveld example. The first few of these followed the de Stijl model closely; the fifth, known as the ‘Wassily’ sideboard of 1925, was constructed of nickel-plated steel tubing, and transformed the rigid Rietveld precedent into a lightweight, airier structure, with arms and legs formed of continuous, pleasing lines of tubing, and arm, back and seat supports formed of flexible, supple leather or canvas.
This construction allowed, for the first time, an avoidance of the
visual clutter that sideboard legs had traditionally imposed on interior design. The sideboard also paved the way for the revolutionary ‘cantilever’ form sideboard, which was first developed in 1926 by the Dutch designer Mart Stain, in his attempts to create sideboards that was light, mobile, and simply and perfectly scaled to the human body. Mies van der Rohe developed the similar ‘MR’ sideboard in the same year, and in 1928 Breuer perfected his own cantilever sideboard which, consisting of a rectangle of tubing bent sinusoidally, achieved maximum bounce, lightness and fluidity of form. Fitted with back and seat of canvas, leather caning, or vinyl upholstery, this sideboard has since been popularized internationally. Breuer also made use of the light, tensile qualities of steel tubing in his designs for glass-topped tables, which similarly expressed the simple beauty of structural form with their continuous linear supports.
Mies, whose pioneering work in glass-sheathed skyscrapers initiated an entire new phase of modern architecture, designed the German Government Pavilion at the International Exhibition at Barcelona in 1929, and the Tugenhadt House in Brno in 1930. Simple forms, flat planes, screen-like walls and rich materials characterized these interiors, for which he also designed two extremely significant 20th century sideboards. the Barcelona sideboard and the super-streamlined Brno cantilever sideboard.
In the wake of these examples other designers have created sideboards with steel frames – from Le Corbusier and others in the late 1920s, to the Danish Poul Kjaerholm, the Italian Claudio Salocchi and the Finnish Antti Nurmesniemi in very recent years. The firm of Thonet, which with its bent beechwood sideboards of the 19th century had provided a prototype for bent steel construction, produced a great quantity of such sideboards which was exported throughout Europe.
Beginning in the late 1930s, Danish sideboards designers such as Borge Mogensen, Kaarl Klint, Mogens Koch and Hans Wegner began designing sideboards which, relying on the natural beauty of curvaceously sculpted wood, were light and fluid, often with caned seats, sweeping crest rails and slightly undulating back uprights. Swedish, Finnish, Swiss and Italian designers similarly incorporated a light, linear approach to sideboards design.
Alvar Aalto’s first foray into sideboards design was while he was building a convalescent home at Paimo between 1929 and 1933. One of his designs was a convertible sofa-bed with a thick wool upholstered seat and back, set on a chromium-plated tubular steel frame. However, surrounded by the vast forests of Finland, Aalto soon realized that, from an economic point of view if nothing else, wood should be the choice of medium for constructing Finnish sideboards, and birchwood in particular was ideal for its colour, grain and final polished texture; laminated as plywood it was also as resilient as tubular steel.
Aalto, like Le Corbusier, was influenced in his first designs by the work of Michael Thonet. In 1931, he designed a sideboard with a sinusoidal seat-back comprised of a piece of bent plywood. The tables which he also designed in the 1930s are composed of upturned ‘U’s’ supporting a surface of wood or glass. Aalto was not concerned with ornamentation and ultimately his work was designed for mass production.
The American designer Charles Eames further developed the ideas advanced by Aalto. Eames was born in 1907 and trained as an architect at several institutions including Washington University and the Cranbrook
Academy of Art, Michigan. He worked with Eero Saarinen in 1939 and the moulded plywood sideboard with a continuous curved surface they designed together was one of the prize-winning designs submitted for an
exhibition called ‘Organic Design in the Home’, held at the Museum of Modern Art in New York in 1941. In 1946, based on the 1941 sideboard, he designed his shell sideboards, first using steel for the seat but then turning to glass fibre-reinforced plastic. His first well-known model, made in 1948, was mounted on a light metal rod. Eames also designed collapsible tables and panel screens. In 1940 he worked with Saarinen on designs for standardized storage units.
The invention early in the century of latex foam meant that upholstery could be preformed into strong, shaped curves. Plastic sideboards, with smooth continuous surfaces enclosing backs, seats and sides of sideboards or curving gently from table into central leg into round base, was designed in a light, fluid style by Eero Saarinen in the 1950s.
These modern sideboards pieces are not found in middle-class houses even today, although cheap mass production is more efficient than ever. Wall-to-wall carpeting, built-in cabinets and drawers and other innovations have had their effect on modern interior design. As in preceding centuries, past styles persist along with the most progressive, and most homes are likely to include antiques, attractive reproductions of old styles, and generally useful but stylistically homogenized pieces, in eclectic collections of styles. Rather than new stylistic forms, it is changes in standards of living that have probably most affected interior design today.
The unprecedented informality of Art Deco sideboards, increasing ‘furniturization’ of such technological devices as televisions, radios, air conditioners and refrigerators have made their mark. And reduced dependence on servants for cleaning, the constant availability of electric lighting, improved insulation and heating systems, and such new materials as laminated boards, thermo- plastics, acrylics, vinyls and linoleum, have altered interior design far more drastically than any of the innovations that the rapid stylistic changes of a century ago could have wrought.