24 May 2012
12:00 BST
Chester
The Beedham Collection: Selected Oak Furniture & Works of Art 1450 - 1750
Back to auction 20460
The Beedham Collection: Selected Oak Furniture & Works of Art 1450 - 1750
Back to auction 20460
A rare Elizabeth I oak and inlaid panel back armchair
Circa 1585-1600
The raked back having a guilloche-carved top rail, above an arched carved panel, with rope-twist arcade and leaf-carved spandrels, stop-fluted columns and inscribe-carved capitals, all enclosing a chevron-inlaid lozenge, the downswept open arms set high and terminating in rare upturned scroll-incised ends, raised on inverted baluster-turned front supports, the boarded seat above channel edge-moulded rails, with sprandrels to the front rail, raised on conforming inverted baluster-turned front supports, joined by plain low stretchers, 62.5cm wide x 56.5cm deep x 109.5cm high, (24.5" wide x 22" deep x 43" high)
The raked back having a guilloche-carved top rail, above an arched carved panel, with rope-twist arcade and leaf-carved spandrels, stop-fluted columns and inscribe-carved capitals, all enclosing a chevron-inlaid lozenge, the downswept open arms set high and terminating in rare upturned scroll-incised ends, raised on inverted baluster-turned front supports, the boarded seat above channel edge-moulded rails, with sprandrels to the front rail, raised on conforming inverted baluster-turned front supports, joined by plain low stretchers, 62.5cm wide x 56.5cm deep x 109.5cm high, (24.5" wide x 22" deep x 43" high)
Sold for
£5,000
inc. premium
Footnotes
- Provenance: Mary Bellis Antiques, Hungerford, Berkshire.
Exhibited: Illustrated Beedham Antiques Ltd, Essentially English, BADA 90th Anniversary Exhibition.
The round, upturned arm ends are an extremely rare feature, and possibly unique to this chair. Reference to the scroll decoration on the sides of the arm ends can be made with Gloucestershire panel back armchairs dated to the reign of Charles I, see V. Chinnery, Oak Furniture: The British Tradition p. 457, fig. 4:87.
An armchair with similar carved rope-twist to the arcading and leaf-carved spandrels, in the Peter Gwynn Collection, dated to 1590, is illustrated, T. Jellinek, Early British Chairs and Seats 1500 to 1700 (2009), p. 94, pl. 90.
The use of Elizabethan simple lozenge inlay as found here is demonstrated on an oak tester bed, dated 1585, and on oak chest, dated 1587, both formerly in the Clive Sherwood Collection, sold Sotheby's, May 2002, Lot 304 and Lot 74 respectively. See also Lot 215 in this sale.
Category: Furniture / Oak Furniture
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