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Lot Essay
Chippendale is the likely maker of these imaginative, carved and ‘japanned’ flower-stands or urns, which evoke visions of Arcadian landscapes. He supplied several pieces of furniture that were japanned in tones of green, blue, gilt and white for many of his select clients in the 1770s. The State Bedroom at Harewood House, Yorkshire, one of Chippendale's most illustrious and extensive commissions, is an opulent display of green and gilt japanned furniture, and a 'Large Antique Vauze [sic]' surmounting the 'exceedingly richly Carved' State Bed is closely comparable to the present urns (1).
The urns are a rare example of Chippendale's 'garden furniture' although these were unlikely to have been used outdoors (2); there is only a single plate dedicated to such furniture in the 3rd edition of the Director, 1762, plate XXIV, for two chairs and a ‘long seat’, intended for ‘Arbours, or Summer-Houses’ and ‘Grottos’. There are three additional drawings attributed to Chippendale for a garden seat, circa 1773, in the collection at Harewood House; a pair of garden seats made to this design were executed by John Walker, a local joiner from the village of Harewood, in 1774 (3).
The design for these flower-stands was undoubtedly inspired from antiquity; examples of classical urns, vases of tazza form and cisterns with drapery festoons were illustrated in James Gibbs’ A Book of Architecture, containing designs of buildings and ornaments (1728), John Vardy’s Some Designs of Mr. Inigo Jones and Mr. William Kent (1744), and Robert and James Adam’s Works in Architecture (1773). The prominently carved and highly distinctive elongated palm leaves displayed on the stands correspond to the giltwood urn finial made for the canopy of the magnificent Harewood state bed, supplied by Chippendale in 1773 (4). Closely related palm leaf ornamentation also appears on other Chippendale furniture: the mahogany ‘Corinthian’ column bedposts of the state bed, 1759, at Dumfries House, Ayrshire, and on the stems of a pair of giltwood fire screens, circa 1772, also for Harewood where it is combined with guilloche motifs, also featured on these stands (5).
Chippendale may have assimilated themes from Darly and Edwards' engravings, particularly A New Book of Chinese Designs (1754), which illustrate chinoiserie and rustic garden furniture. Thus, Darly’s design for a hall chair published in 1750 was possibly reinterpreted as a japanned green and white garden chair by Chippendale. It was believed to have been supplied in 1769 to David Garrick (1717-79), the celebrated actor, playwright and theatre manager for the Chinese Temple erected at Stratford to celebrate the Shakespeare Jubilee (6). Garrick engaged Chippendale over a period of ten years from 1768 in furnishing his London houses at 27 Southampton Street and 5 Royal Adelphi Terrace and at his riverside villa on the banks of the Thames at Hampton, the accounts revealing a large amount of 'Japann'd green & white' furniture.
The flower-stands were intended for an interior where they would have been placed against a wall as the backs are only partially decorated, but could alternatively have been moved outdoors at whim. The 1795 and 1801 Harewood inventories show that the mansion contained a number of flower-stands; in 1795, in ‘Lord Harewood’s Bedroom’, ‘2 Green and White Japann’d Flower Stands’, in the ‘Little Dining Room’, 2 Green Painted Flower Stands’ and in the ‘Blue Dressing Room’, ‘2 Japann’d Corner Flower Stands’. One specific model, originally made in green and gold, was supplied to the Salon at Harewood, and to neighbouring Nostell Priory (7).
THE WRIGHTSMANS
These flower-stands formed part of the remarkable collection of Mr. and Mrs. Charles B. Wrightsman and were showcased in their Palm Beach estate. 'Blythedunes' was purchased from Mona Williams (later Countess von Bismarck) who, together with Syrie Maugham, had created stylish interiors during the 1930s - a hybrid of modern and traditional English design. When the Wrightsmans purchased the estate in 1947, stunning Chinese wallpaper installed by the Williams's became the backdrop for Mrs. Wrightsman's gradual transformation of the interiors to her preferred taste of the French ancien régime. These flower-stands were amongst the few pieces of Georgian furniture to complement the spectacular newly designed interiors, appropriately placed in the Chinese-papered drawing room.
(1) C. Gilbert, The Life and Work of Thomas Chippendale, London, 1978, vol. II, p. 32, fig. 51.
(2) Gilbert, op. cit., vol. I, p. 108.
(3). Ibid., vol. II, p. 204, figs. 372-375.
(4). Ibid., pp. 32-33, fig. 54.
(5). Ibid., p. 26, fig. 42; p. 185, fig. 335.
(6). C. Gilbert, ‘The Early Furniture Designs of Matthias Darly’, Furniture History Society, vol. 11 (1975), fig. 69.
(7). Ibid., pp. 210-211, figs. 383-384.
THE DECORATION
These flower-stands were cleaned and re-painted probably between 1920 and 1950, and have been repainted with the same (present) scheme twice since. Underneath these layers, a remnant of an earlier decorative scheme, including oil gilding, was found. The layers and technique used in this earlier scheme of gesso, yellow ochre, glue size and finally oil gilding over a yellow oil size, are consistent with an 18th century date and of a type not employed in the 19th century.
The urns are a rare example of Chippendale's 'garden furniture' although these were unlikely to have been used outdoors (2); there is only a single plate dedicated to such furniture in the 3rd edition of the Director, 1762, plate XXIV, for two chairs and a ‘long seat’, intended for ‘Arbours, or Summer-Houses’ and ‘Grottos’. There are three additional drawings attributed to Chippendale for a garden seat, circa 1773, in the collection at Harewood House; a pair of garden seats made to this design were executed by John Walker, a local joiner from the village of Harewood, in 1774 (3).
The design for these flower-stands was undoubtedly inspired from antiquity; examples of classical urns, vases of tazza form and cisterns with drapery festoons were illustrated in James Gibbs’ A Book of Architecture, containing designs of buildings and ornaments (1728), John Vardy’s Some Designs of Mr. Inigo Jones and Mr. William Kent (1744), and Robert and James Adam’s Works in Architecture (1773). The prominently carved and highly distinctive elongated palm leaves displayed on the stands correspond to the giltwood urn finial made for the canopy of the magnificent Harewood state bed, supplied by Chippendale in 1773 (4). Closely related palm leaf ornamentation also appears on other Chippendale furniture: the mahogany ‘Corinthian’ column bedposts of the state bed, 1759, at Dumfries House, Ayrshire, and on the stems of a pair of giltwood fire screens, circa 1772, also for Harewood where it is combined with guilloche motifs, also featured on these stands (5).
Chippendale may have assimilated themes from Darly and Edwards' engravings, particularly A New Book of Chinese Designs (1754), which illustrate chinoiserie and rustic garden furniture. Thus, Darly’s design for a hall chair published in 1750 was possibly reinterpreted as a japanned green and white garden chair by Chippendale. It was believed to have been supplied in 1769 to David Garrick (1717-79), the celebrated actor, playwright and theatre manager for the Chinese Temple erected at Stratford to celebrate the Shakespeare Jubilee (6). Garrick engaged Chippendale over a period of ten years from 1768 in furnishing his London houses at 27 Southampton Street and 5 Royal Adelphi Terrace and at his riverside villa on the banks of the Thames at Hampton, the accounts revealing a large amount of 'Japann'd green & white' furniture.
The flower-stands were intended for an interior where they would have been placed against a wall as the backs are only partially decorated, but could alternatively have been moved outdoors at whim. The 1795 and 1801 Harewood inventories show that the mansion contained a number of flower-stands; in 1795, in ‘Lord Harewood’s Bedroom’, ‘2 Green and White Japann’d Flower Stands’, in the ‘Little Dining Room’, 2 Green Painted Flower Stands’ and in the ‘Blue Dressing Room’, ‘2 Japann’d Corner Flower Stands’. One specific model, originally made in green and gold, was supplied to the Salon at Harewood, and to neighbouring Nostell Priory (7).
THE WRIGHTSMANS
These flower-stands formed part of the remarkable collection of Mr. and Mrs. Charles B. Wrightsman and were showcased in their Palm Beach estate. 'Blythedunes' was purchased from Mona Williams (later Countess von Bismarck) who, together with Syrie Maugham, had created stylish interiors during the 1930s - a hybrid of modern and traditional English design. When the Wrightsmans purchased the estate in 1947, stunning Chinese wallpaper installed by the Williams's became the backdrop for Mrs. Wrightsman's gradual transformation of the interiors to her preferred taste of the French ancien régime. These flower-stands were amongst the few pieces of Georgian furniture to complement the spectacular newly designed interiors, appropriately placed in the Chinese-papered drawing room.
(1) C. Gilbert, The Life and Work of Thomas Chippendale, London, 1978, vol. II, p. 32, fig. 51.
(2) Gilbert, op. cit., vol. I, p. 108.
(3). Ibid., vol. II, p. 204, figs. 372-375.
(4). Ibid., pp. 32-33, fig. 54.
(5). Ibid., p. 26, fig. 42; p. 185, fig. 335.
(6). C. Gilbert, ‘The Early Furniture Designs of Matthias Darly’, Furniture History Society, vol. 11 (1975), fig. 69.
(7). Ibid., pp. 210-211, figs. 383-384.
THE DECORATION
These flower-stands were cleaned and re-painted probably between 1920 and 1950, and have been repainted with the same (present) scheme twice since. Underneath these layers, a remnant of an earlier decorative scheme, including oil gilding, was found. The layers and technique used in this earlier scheme of gesso, yellow ochre, glue size and finally oil gilding over a yellow oil size, are consistent with an 18th century date and of a type not employed in the 19th century.