Very Fine and Rare William and Mary Inlaid and Figured Walnut High Chest of Drawers, Attributed to Samuel Clement, New York, Circa 1720

John S. Walton, New York.

New York, Museum of the City of New York, Furniture by New York Cabinetmakers: 1650 to 1860, November 1956-March 1957, no. 20. 

Isabelle Miller, Furniture by New York Cabinetmakers 1650-1860 (New York: Museum of the City of New York, 1956): no. 20, p. 21.

Wear commensurate with age and use. A 2"x4" veneer patch to the back edge of each side of the top case. Approximately 1/2" of the bottom of the feet is lacking. Secondary wood: poplar and white pine.
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With burlwood walnut veneers surrounded by bands of contrasting veneers on its front and veneered sides, this William and Mary high chest is an extremely rare example of the form from New York. It reflects the Baroque concern for verticality and the contrast between thick and thin components. For example, the six trumpet-and-cup turned legs are remarkable for the heavy dome quality of their cups, which contrast the sharp narrowing of the trumpet turnings. The cabinetmaker’s decision to pierce the leg turnings at their narrowest visual point with a series of flat, horizontal stretchers further adds to the overall scheme. Very few other veneered William and Mary chests of this type from New York are known. One with book-matched figured walnut veneers surrounded by herringbone bands of maple and eastern red cedar is at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.¹ A high chest made of gumwood representing a similar shop tradition was made in 1726 by the Flushing carpenter-joiner, Samuel Clement (act. 1698-1726), for Samuel Lawrence, a member of a prominent Quaker merchant family of Flushing.²  The high chest and its en suite dressing table are in the collection of Winterthur Museum.³ Both pieces are made of gumwood, a wood commonly used for case pieces made in New York though far less popular for furniture made in the other colonies.  Another gumwood high chest of this type was sold in these rooms, Important Americana, October 9, 1997, sale 7025, lot 479.  An additional example made of walnut was sold in these rooms, The Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Walter M. Jeffords, October 28-9, 2004, sale 8016, lot 207. 

¹ See Frances Safford, American Furniture in The Metropolitan Museum of Art, I. Early Colonial Period: The Seventeenth-Century and William and Mary Styles (New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, no. 172, pp. 327-330.
² See Dean Failey, Long Island is My Nation: The Decorative Arts & Cratsmen, 1640-1830 (Cold Spring Harbor, NY: Society for the Preservation of Long Island Antiquities, 1976): nos. 39 and 40, p. 38-9.
³ Winterthur Museum #1957.0512.