A Highly Important Queen Anne Double-Domed Black and Gold Japanned Bureau Bookcase by W. Price, 1713

Arthur S. Vernay, Inc., New York;

The Collection of the Hon. Mr. and Mrs. C. Douglas Dillon, sold Sotheby's New York, 24 October 1992, Lot 400 ($231,000);

A Celebration of the English Country House, Sotheby's New York, 7 April 2004, lot 250 ($411,200)

Adam Bowett, English Furniture 1660-1714 From Charles II to Queen Anne, Woodbridge 2002, 'Case Furniture 1689-1714’ pp. 221-223. fig. 7:53

Benno Forman, 'The Chest of Drawers in America, 1635–1730: The Origins of the Joined Chest of Drawers', Winterthur Portfolio 20, no. 1 (Spring 1985), p.23 figs. 19, 20

R. W. Symonds, 'A Japanned Desk-and-Bookcase', Country Life, 13 February 1948, pp. 332-333, figs. 1-5

Although England had established a number of trading connections with China in the early 17th century, these became virtually non-existent in 1637 when the Dutch were granted exclusive rights to this trade. The English merchants, who were already somewhat constrained by the rise of the Cromwell and Commonwealth, were therefore forced to deal with their Dutch Rivals.

After the Restoration of Charles II, trade, both with the East and Europe, increased dramatically, introducing new and exotic wares including those decorated with lacquer. These were also introduced to the new court by Charles's retinue including his wife Catherine of Braganza, John Evelyn noting in his diary on June 9, 1662 that ‘The Queen brought over with her from Portugal such Indian cabinets as had never before been seen here'. The Queen's dowry also included the Indian port of Bombay, which rapidly became one of the East India Company's major trading posts, its charter having been renewed by Charles II in 1672. The trade in lacquered wares increased dramatically after this date, cargos carried by the merchantmen Sarah, Martha and Dorothy being valued at £150,000. The goods included such items as 'fans, trunks, inlaid tables, panels in frame, painted and carved for rooms, Tables, not inlaid and Board for screens' (Huth op.cit). It is also recorded in 1688 that a Captain Dampier was aware of another captain who took a joiner with him to China, together with a quantity of deal boards 'to make fashionable Commodities to be lacquered, and in 1672-3 the East India Company sent over 'several artificers to the east to teach Indians how to manufacture goods to make them vendible in England. Furthermore, in 1684 the factor of the Company in Tonkin was informed that ‘we have Sent you to help fill up your Ship some quantity of Joiner ware to be lacquered there'. It should be noted that the description Indian did not always refer to that country, but also encompassed China and the whole region, geographical knowledge being somewhat uncertain at that time.

Naturally this huge interest in Chinese lacquer, which had been described by John Nieuhoff in 1644 as being made to 'shine and glister like Looking-glasses' attracted many imitators. As early as 1663

Samuel Pepys recorded in his diary on May 23 that he visited a man called

Greatorex who had invented a varnish that appeared 'every whit as good, upon a stick which he had done, as the Indian’. In 1688 John Stalker and George Parker published a fascinating work entitled A Treatise of Japaning and Varnishing which was 'a compleat Discovery of those Arts. With The best way of making all sorts of VARNISH for JAPAN WOOD, PRINTS, OR PICTURES, and 'Above an Hundred distinct Patterns for JAPAN-work, in Imitation of the Indians, for Tables, Stands, Frames, Cabinets, Boxes, &c". They refer to the Chinese fashion as an art very much admired by us' and include in their volume, obviously addressed to both the professional and amateur worker, full instruction and recipes for creating japanned finishes in imitation of eastern lacquer By 1695 professional japanners had established themselves as ‘Patentees for lacquering after the manner of Japan’ advertising a lottery of ‘cabinets, execrators, tablets, stands, looking glasses, tea tables, chimney pieces, etc.’ This unusual manner of selling their goods was possibly occasioned by the extreme rivalry which had arisen between them and the East India Company, which finally led to the Company to withold permission for the private trade in gum lacca. In 1701 they petitioned Parliament to suppress imports of lacquer wares, declaring that ‘Many of the Artificers in the same Art and Mystery have brought it to so great a Perfection as to exceed all manner of Indian lacquer’. Although Parliament did indeed impose higher import duties, this did not actually improve the situation of the English craftsmen who discovered that the East India Company immediately found new markets in Spain and Portugal, countries with which they already had extensive trade. Although japanned wares are often mentioned in existing late 17th century accounts, due to the fragile nature of their surfaces, few have survived which can be dated with some certainty, or ascribed to a definite maker; the present desk-and-bookcase signed W. Price 1713 is therefore of great rarity.

Its form illustrates the pinnacle of a design which had gradually evolved during the late 17th/18th century from the early form of a moveable desk in the form of a box with a rising sloping lid which was used as a book or paper rest. This form was described in 1584 as 'a little holowe desk lyk a coffer, whereupon men do write', and was commonly fashioned in oak which was occasionally painted, covered in leather or carved. In the late 1670s this form is found on a fixed stand, the hinges on the slope being reversed to enable the inner 'slope’ to be used as a writing surface which was supported on extending lopers. By the late 1690s this form of desk was fitted below with drawers, and by the early 1700s the first 'desk-and-bookcases' appeared. As can be seen in the present piece, which is constructed in three distinctive parts, one can still clearly discern the origins of the design and although the central desk no longer extends over the chest base, it is still separated by a large molding. As Dr. Bowett has noted (op. cit.), separating a carcase into three has no obvious merit other than to allow a cabinet shop to utilize its workmen more efficiently, different skills being required in the making of the carcase and drawers and the interior fitments. This form of construction did, however, continue into the 1730s.

The actual description 'desk-and-bookcase' appears to be first recorded in the accounts of the Royal cabinet-maker Gerrit Jensen (f1.1680-d. 1715) who supplied several for the Royal Household from 1710 (Bowett, op. cit.), and another described as 'a walnut writing desk, the top for books and patons and glass in the doors asked' for the 5th Earl of Salisbury, Hatfield House. Another maker of this form of desk was the London cabinet-maker John Gumley (1691-1727) who advertised in Richard Steele's Lover on April 24 1714 that he hath taken for a Ware-house, and furnished all the upper Part of the New Exchange in the Strand' continuing with an extensive list of his stock including 'Desks and Bookcases’. In 1714 he supplied one of these in walnut to James Ist Duke of Montrose for the sum of £11.

The origins of W. Price, who made and signed the present desk-and-bookcase in 1713, are at the present time unclear. No other accounts or signed pieces of furniture appear to have survived, although this piece indicates that he was obviously a cabinet-maker and japanner of no ordinary skills. The workmanship is of exceptional quality and facets of the design and its execution having a number of unique features. Its overall form, with its double-domed cornice, does have similarities to other unattributed desks, although the manner in which the outer mirrored doors are framed within flat columns with Corinthian capitals appears to be unique in japanned pieces; this design is, however, recorded on number of walnut examples. The nearest parallel is found on a pair of undocumented corner cabinets (from a suite of four), now in the Gerstenfeld collection, which have similar columns decorated in gold on a red ground in a 'cracked-ice pattern’, although the gilt capitals are slightly truncated. The japanned decoration on the drawers, depicting oriental landscapes interspersed raised figures with buildings, flowers and trees and the similar larger scenes on the sides, is also closely related to other examples. As in these, scale is abandoned, with tiny figures dwarfed by large buildings and oversized flowering trees and birds. In contrast to this, the decoration on the fall is extremely mannered, with excellent scale and perspective. It may tentatively be suggested that, unlike the other decoration, the depicted scene might have been copied from an as yet untraced contemporary printed source and illustrates an actual recorded event. The piece is surmounted by carved allegorical figures which might seem to fit strangely with the purely oriental subjects ornamenting the japanned decoration, but these also have parallels on other desk-and-bookcases. A veneered walnut example, circa 1715, with a flattened double-arched cornice from the collection of the Countess of Carlisle, Castle Howard, and now in the Burrell Collection, has four similar carved giltwood figures, and another in veneered walnut with an arched broken pediment has three figures (See: Edwards, op.cit.). All these figures were probably acquired from a specialist carver, possibly Flemish, working in London, the designs being inspired by earlier Renaissance bronzes. It is interesting to note that an elaborate brass inlaid writing cabinet, circa 1745, attributed to John Cannon and now at Temple Newsam House, is surmounted by similarly conceived git-bronze figures which are based on Soldani bronzes after antique and 'Old master] models’ (see: op. cit.). 

One of the most fascinating and possibly unique elements of this desk-and-bookcase is the manner in which the upper part is fitted. All other recorded examples appear to be japanned in the

manner of the exteriors whereas this example is finished in wainscot oak and inlaid veneered walnut. The wainscot oak seen on the interior of the cabinet and on the inner doors is probably of Baltic origin, this timber being of particularly straight, even grain and free of knots. A slow growing timber, it was not susceptible to warping and was easily worked. It was more costly than English varieties and as Dr. Bowett remarks ‘it can be taken as a hallmark of quality.’ Of particular note is the inlaid cipher on the doors, which again is unparalleled on this form of furniture, although they are occasionally found, together with coats of arms on contemporary carved gilt-gesso furniture. Unfortunately, it would be mere speculation to attempt to link the initials J.S. with a specific person, although they obviously belong to the original owner. The fitted interior, concealed by the fall, is veneered with richly figured walnut and inlaid with feather –banding. Although the configuration of the small drawers, pigeon holes and concealed drawers and well follows other examples both japanned and veneered, the present piece appears to be the

only one to combine the two. As such, it is an incomparable example of its form, conceived by a sadly undocumented but highly imaginative maker who was obviously a master of his craft.

WILLIAM PRICE AND THE BOSTON CONNECTION

Although William Price's other activity in England is unknown, archival sources document a William Price of Ipswich, Suffolk, who took on an apprentice named Stannard in 1712, and the records of the London Joiners’ Company also mention an apprentice named Price, his Christian name sadly not listed, who received his freedom in 1713, the same year as the date of this cabinet.

It is highly plausible he is the same William Price who emigrated from England to Boston in 1714 and established a cabinetmaking enterprise specializing in japanned furniture, later becoming a successful merchant and print seller. He was also involved in the construction of Christ Church Boston, better known as Old North Church, the city's oldest surviving ecclesiastical building and in whose steeple were hung lanterns warning of the arrival of British troops the evening of 18 April 1775, prompting the celebrated Midnight Ride of Paul Revere. Benno Forman (Winterthur Portfolio 20, no. 1, Spring 1985, p. 21) supports this identification and believes this bureau cabinet is 'the only piece of furniture made by a craftsman before he immigrated to America so far identified.'

Price's association with japanned work is confirmed by an advertisement in a 1726 trade gazette in which he offers 'All Sorts of Looking-Glasses of the newest Fashion & Japan Work, viz. Chests of Drawers, Corner Cupboards, Large and Small Tea Tables & c. done after the best manner by one late from London' (cited in Alan Miller, 'Roman Gusto in New England, a Boston Furniture Designer and his Shop,' American Furniture, Chipstone Foundation 1993, p.162). Boston was the primary centre for japanned case furniture and objects in the American colonies, decorated almost exclusively in a black and gold palette which later expanded to include a type of faux-tortoiseshell lacquer. In addition to Price, two of the best documented Boston japanners of the early 18th century were also immigrant cabinetmakers from England, Robert Davis and William Randle (see Tara Cederholm and Christine Palmer Thomson, 'Tortoiseshell and Gold: Robert Davis and the Art of Japanning in Eighteenth-Century Boston,' Boston Furniture 1700-1900, Boston 2016, pp. 49-77). The present bureau cabinet represents a fascinating and exceptionally rare link between English and American furniture design at the dawn of the Georgian era.

See:

Ralph Edwards, The Dictionary of English Furniture, London 1953, Vol. I, p. 139, figs. 37, 38. for two walnut desk-and-bookcases with related carved giltwood figures;

Hans Huth, Lacquer of the West, Chicago, 1971;

Christopher Gilbert, Furniture at Temple Newsam House and Lotherton Hall, Leeds 1998. vol. III, no. 680. pp. 563-566;

John Julius Norwich, The Burrell Collection, Glasgow Museum and Art Gallery, 1983, p. 132, fig. 2, for a walnut desk-and-bookcase, from the collection of the Countess of Carlisle, Castle Howard, with related carved giltwood figures. 

Geoffrey Beard and Christopher Gilbert, Dictionary of English Furniture Makers 1660-1840, Leeds 1978, p. 716;

The Magazine Antiques, June, 1987, 'Living with Antiques', William Rieder, pp. 1314-1325, pl. II, the Gerstenfeld corner cabinet