A fine pair of George III giltwood marble top D-shaped pier tables circa 1775

Acquired from the dealer Cecil Partridge by French & Company of New York, March 3, 1932, for the sum of $600.00, stock number 38725 (See: French & Company archives, accession number 840027, The Getty Research Institute, Box 45, folder 1).

Sold by French & Company to Henry L. Moses, March 12, 1934

Sold, Sotheby's, New York, Property from the Estate of Mrs. Lucy Goldschmidt Moses, October 19, 1991, lot 277

The profiles of these tables, which are enriched by their finely detailed carved ornament, clearly illustrate the neo-classical form and decoration as practiced by the architect Robert Adam and his contemporaries in the 1770s.  Below the marble tops, the leaf tip moldings project above a plain burnished frieze applied with foliate scrolls with flower-head terminals which are related to a drawing for a pier mirror for Luton Park, Bedfordshire, illustrated in The Works in Architecture of Robert and James Adam, 1822, the engraving dated 1772, and the pendant leaf collars at the top of the fluted legs may be compared with those on a pair of pier tables supplied to Appuldurcombe, Isle of Wight, by Thomas Chippendale, c. 1776-8 (See: Christopher Gilbert, The Life and Work of Thomas Chippendale, 1978, p. 273, fig. 499).  The oval tablets, carved in low relief with neo-classical urns with ram's-head handles centering the apron, also illustrate a not-uncommon decorative element of this period found, not only on pier tables, but also mirrors and mantelpieces.  Unfortunately, as with the original swags of husks below the apron and the circular patera found on the collars of the legs, the extreme quality of all the carved ornament is now obscured by later gesso and gilding, although this could easily be revealed with careful restoration.

Cf. a related suite of tables, including a pier table and two corner tables, Sotheby & Co., London, The Ionides Collections, part I, May 31, 1963, lot 187.