A George I walnut and burr-walnut cabinet on chest, circa 1715, in the manner of Coxed and Woster

Possibly Thomas 1st Earl of Pomfret (1690-1753), being part of the original furnishing of Easton Neston;

Recorded in the first inventory of the contents of the house in 1889;

Sold Sotheby's, Easton Neston, 17-19th May 2005, lot 225.

T.G.Litchfield, 3 Bruton St., London, The Valuation and Inventory of the more important Furniture, China, Articles of Vertu, Decorations and Pictures at Easton Neston, February 1889, typed document (Familly Archive), p.31 (standing on the Picture (Long) Gallery);

H. Avray Tipping, `Easton Neston -II, Northamptonshire, The Seat of Sir Thomas Fermor-Hesketh Bt.', Country Life, 14 November 1908, p.671, illus. standing at the head of The Great Staircase;

F 1910, p.74 & 75, as "a 4' 6" Queen Anne Walnut Chest of 12 small drawers enclosed by two panelled doors & 2 large and 2 small drawer, brass drop handels escutcheons and hinges engraved" in the Blue Room;

H. Avray Tipping, 'Easton Neston - II, Northamptonshire, The Seat of Sir Thomas Fermor-Hesketh, Bt', Country Life, 27 August 1927, p.99, fig.6, The First Floor Gallery;

H. Avray Tipping & Christopher Hussey, 'Easton Neston', English Homes, Period IV - Vol. II, 1928, p.134, fig.185, The First Floor Gallery

This impressive cabinet-on-chest features not only highly decorative quartered burr veneers to the panel doors, but also incorporates distinctively Japanese corner hinges. These unmistakeable hinges are clearly influenced by the lacquer cabinets-on-stands that came to Europe via the Dutch East India Company, and became prized collector’s pieces – an example of corner hinges in this style can be seen on the Japanese cabinet in this sale, lot 109. These hinges contrast with the European practice of concealing hinges in the interior of cabinet doors, and often make an appearance on English pieces that have been ‘japanned’ to imitate lacquer, as on the piece pictured as plates 3:82 and 3:83 in Bowett’s Early Georgian Furniture 1715-1740.¹ When they do appear on cabinets of more English form, they tend to be attributed to Coxed and Woster on account of the labelled examples pictured in the Pictorial Dictionary of Marked London Furniture 1700-1840.² For example, a wood-veneered example with these Japanese-style hinges was offered at Christie’s New York, 14^th October 2004, lot 41. These distinctive hinges also often overlap with so-called ‘mulberry’ staining to the veneers and pewter stringing, both absent on the present lot but seen on the above-mentioned examples. Another detail that suggests a Coxed and Woster attribution for the present lot, though, is the unusual scrolled feet, which are rare but present on an example by Coxed and Woster pictured in English Furniture 1500-1840.³ The quality and scale of this lot raise the possibility of a bespoke commission, making it plausible that the scrolled feet and hinges were preferred by a client who decided against the other typical feature of the work of Coxed and Woster, the ‘mulberry’ surface.

Easton Neston is a house in Northamptonshire that is one of the architectural gems of the English Baroque style – built in 1702, it is the only private mansion designed solely by Nicholas Hawksmoor. Since it was continually in the private hands of the Fermor-Hesketh family by descent until 2005, the house was not opened to the public and remained somewhat mysterious. This cabinet-on-chest was visible in the 1908 and 1927 articles on Easton Neston in Country Life, and was sold as part of the two-part sale of selected contents of the house at Sotheby’s on 17th-19th May 2005.

¹ Adam Bowett, Early Georgian Furniture 1715-1740, Woodbridge, 2009, pp.138-139, pl.3:82 and 3:83.

² Christopher Gilbert, Pictorial Dictionary of Marked London Furniture 1700-1840, Leeds, 1996, pp.156-157, figs. 241 and 242.

³ Geoffrey Beard and Judith Goodison, English Furniture 1500-1840, Oxford, 1987, p.70, fig.1.