From Versailles: A Louis XVI amaranth and bois satiné commode by Jean-Henri Riesener, circa 1779

UK: Greenford Park Warehouse

Lot Closed

April 11, 03:05 PM GMT

Estimate

80,000 - 120,000 GBP

Lot Details

Description

of breakfront form, with a later rectangular mottled peach and grey marble top with rounded corners, above three frieze drawers mounted with elaborate gilt-bronze escutcheons with winged cherubs and scrolling foliage, the rounded corners mounted with a fused brackets cast with husks and with a berried laurel swag above two further long drawers, with gilt-bronze ribbon-tied berried laurel garland handles and escutcheons, later apron, on cabriole legs with gilt-bronze acanthus and husk mounts terminating in hairy paw feet; stamped J H RIESENER to top corners of carcass, with the marque au fer of the Château of Versailles and inventory no.3019 in black ink, the interior of the right-hand drawer retaining a paper ink manuscript inventory label ‘T223’; the underside of the commode retaining traces of a printed label ‘baggages Déposés’, together with a printed paper railway label ‘Depart / 2914’, and another label, partly scratched ‘Destination Fontainebleau’; re-mounted and re-gilded

87cm. high, 130cm. wide, 59.5cm. deep; 2ft. 10 ¼in., 4ft. 3 ¼in., 1ft. 11 ⅜in.

Delivered by the royal Garde-Meuble to the Château of Versailles in 1779 for the apartment of the Comte de Noailles, also known as the duc de Mouchy (1715-1794);

William Lever, 1st Viscount Leverhulme (1851-1925), acquired before 1900, in the Cloakroom at Thornton Manor in 1904 (inv. TM. 1904, p.18), transferred to the Drawing Room by 1907 (inv. TM. 1907, p. 15, inv. TM. 1912-13, p.17);

William Hulme Lever, 2nd Viscount Leverhulme (1888-1949), in the French Drawing Room in 1949 (T.Inv. T223);

Philip William Bryce Lever, 3rd Viscount Leverhulme (1915-2000), in the French Drawing Room;

Sotheby’s, The Leverhulme Sale, 26-28^th June 2001, lot 46;

where acquired by the present owner.

Lucy Wood, Catalogue of Commodes, 1994, p.318.

Inventories:

TM 1904, Valuation of Furniture & Decorative Objects for Fire Insurance. Dated November 29th 1904

TM 1907, Inventory and Valuation of Furniture & Decorative Objects at Thornton Manor, Thornton Hough, Cheshire. Dated June 12^th 1907.

TM 1912-13, Inventory of Furniture & Decorative Objects at Sir W.H Lever’s – Thornton Manor. Thornton Hough. Cheshire. Assigned to between July 1912 and early 1914 on internal evidence.

T. Inventory, Furniture, China and Glass, Floor Coverings and Silver at Thornton Manor. Assigned 1949 on internal evidence.

Christie’s London, Terence Rodrigues (ed.), Treasures of the North, 2000, p.156, pl.117.