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Lot Essay
The coat-of arms adorning the beautiful Chinese lacquer backs of these banqueting hall chairs is that of William Heathcote (1693-1751). The chairs were almost certainly commissioned to celebrate his marriage in 1720 to Lady Elizabeth Parker, daughter of Thomas Parker, the 1st Earl of Macclesfield. Heathcote’s father Samuel Heathcote was a merchant and director of the East India Company; and while William Heathcote followed in his father’s mercantile footsteps, his brother Sir Gilbert Heathcote was the Governor of the Bank of England. William Heathcote retired in 1715 when he inherited a fortune of £90,000 from his father and entered politics, serving as MP for Buckingham from 1722-27 and as MP for Southampton until 1741. He was created a baronet in 1733 and as the arms on these chairs are for Heathcote impaling Parker and do not include a baronet’s coronet, the chairs can be dated fairly precisely to between 1720 and 1733, the period between Heathcote’s marriage and his elevation to the baronetcy. The chairs were intended to furnish Hursley Park, Hampshire, which Heathcote had acquired in 1718 from the daughters of Richard Cromwell and which he set about remodeling with the assistance of the architect Sir Thomas Hewett, a role Hewett had similarly undertaken for Heathcote’s father-in-law at Shirburn Castle. Originally a set of eight, the chairs were sold as part of the Heathcote Heirlooms at Christie’s in 1938. Most recently one pair from the suite was sold at Sotheby’s, London, 29 November 2002, lot 152 (£96,850).
LACQUERED FURNITURE AND THE EAST INDIA COMPANY
This distinctive model of hall chair is closely associated with the China Trade of the East India Company. It seems probable that the backs were executed in China, for patrons connected with the Company such as Heathcote, and then mounted on japanned seats and legs in London. A closely related set of four hall chairs with lacquered backs above japanned seats and legs are decorated with the coat-of-arms of Sir Gregory Page Bt. (1668-1720), for Wricklemarsh, Kent, who, like Samuel Heathcote, was a director and later chairman of the East India Company. These chairs can be dated to circa 1714-20, and according to Adam Bowett are the earliest known datable chair with this leg design (A. Bowett, Early Georgian Furniture 1715-1740, Woodbridge, 2009, pp. 154-5 and fig. 4:16; a pair of chairs was first sold at Christie's Wricklemarsh house sale, 23-29 April 1783; and again at Christie's, London, 15 November 1990, lot 69). Page must have favored the model, as a suite of furniture with similar frames but in walnut and padouk comprising four chairs, two stools and a sofa was also supplied to him for Wricklemarsh at the same time and was later in the collection of William Hesketh Lever (1851-1925), 1st Viscount Leverhulme (sold from The Art Collections of the Late Viscount Leverhulme, Anderson Galleries, New York, 9 February 1926, lot 137). The sofa from the suite was later in the collection of the Duke and Duchess of Kent, sold Christie’s, Derby House, London, 12-14 March 1947, lot 349 and subsequently sold at Christie's, London, 22 January 2009, lot 100 (£99,650 including premium). The Page family’s links to China through the East India Company are further underlined in the set of eight Chinese Export hall chairs, dated to circa 1725-35, constructed in rosewood inlaid with the coat-of-arms of Sir Gregory Page, 2nd Bt. (1695-1775) and Kenward (for his wife Martha Kenward, whom he married in 1721) in mother-of-pearl and with mahogany seats, which are now in the Sir John Soane Museum [no.XF296] – though clearly made to European prototypes, these chairs have distinct characteristics of Chinese joinery.
A further closely-related pair of japanned armorial hall chairs feature not only the ‘flying’ brackets to the top of the legs but also the shell-centered front seatrail similar to those on the Heathcote chairs. While the coat-of-arms is no longer discernible on this pair of chairs, they were probably made for a member of the East India Company, and the red shield that remains to the center of the armorial cartouche indicates that the man for whom they were made was married to an heiress (sold Christie’s, London, 27 November 2003, lot 51). A set of sixteen chairs with the same shaped lacquered backs decorated with coats-of-arms but lacking landscapes was almost certainly supplied to Robert Child between 1715, when he was knighted, and his death in 1721. Like several other members of his immediate family, Child was closely connected to the Company and had been elected Chairman in the same year as his knighthood. The chairs, which have replaced bases (probably made in the late 18th or early 19th century), remain at Osterley today, where they were first recorded in the 1782 inventory, along with a lacquer domed coffer (also with Robert Child’s coat-of-arms) that was sold at Christie’s (London, 3 July 1997, lot 16, £32,200), the pair to which is probably now in the Gallery at Osterley.
A set of chairs of nearly identical form made entirely in pine and lacking their decoration highlights the fact that, as well as furniture being partly made in China and sent to England for finishing (as with the japanned seats and legs of the Heathcote and Page chairs), there is a history of undecorated furniture, including bureau bookcases, that was constructed in England and sent to China for lacquering (this set of chairs was formerly in the Collection of Dodi Rosekrans, sold Sotheby’s, New York, 8-9 December 2011, lot 31). It was relatively inexpensive to send undecorated furniture to China for decoration, with pieces serving as ballast in what would be ‘empty’ cargo ships leaving from England in order to take back pieces made in China for the export market (Bowett, op. cit., pp. 154-155; and A. Bowett, English Furniture from Charles II to Queen Anne, 1660-1714, Woodbridge, 2002, pp. 147-9).
THE DESIGN AND POSSIBLE MAKERS
The chairs’ distinctive ‘flying’ brackets place them in a specific group of furniture made in the early 18th century. The source of the ‘flying’ brackets is a stylistic mystery with echoes in both Chinese 17th-century furniture and the designs of Daniel Marot. In terms of function, perhaps the bracket compensated for the need to have stretchers by providing greater stability to the legs and frames. Whatever the origins, the result is an entirely unique English form. Most notable of this group which features the same distinctive ‘flying’ S-scrolled brackets, many of which are attributed to the Royal cabinet-maker James Moore (c. 1670-1726), is the celebrated Browsholme suite of furniture, originally silvered and now gilded, including at least six side chairs, two stools and a table. The suite was almost certainly supplied by James Moore to Edward Parker (d. 1728) for Browsholme Hall, Lancashire, who was a distant cousin of Sir William Heathcote’s father-in-law, Thomas Parker, Earl of Macclesfield (sold The Exceptional Sale, Christie’s, London, 7 July 2011, lot 23, £181,500 including premium).
James Moore the Elder (1670-1726) had premises 'over against the Golden Bottle in Shorts Gardens’, St. Giles-in-the-Fields and became cabinet-maker to George I and the Prince and Princess of Wales, later George II, the commissions for whom he was in partnership with John Gumley from 1714. Moore was influenced by contemporary designs from France disseminated through works such as Daniel Marot's Nouveau Livre d'Orfeverie, 1703, which included designs for silver furniture, and by the work of Jean, René and Thomas Pelletier (T. Murdoch, 'Jean, René and Thomas Pelletier, a Huguenot family of carvers and gilders in England 1682-1726 - Part I', The Burlington Magazine, November 1997, p. 738, fig. 11). In his own capacity Moore served leading members of the British aristocracy including the Duke of Chandos and the Duke and Duchess of Marlborough, who appointed him Comptroller of Works at Blenheim in 1716 as successor to Sir John Vanbrugh, and became known as the duchess’s ‘Oracle’ (C. Gilbert [ed.], Dictionary of English Furniture Makers 1660-1840, Leeds, 1986, pp. 618-9). Moore was likely the author of a pair of gilt-gesso tables made for Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough at Blenheim, which combine a scrolled bracket with a broken cabriole leg – an early iteration of the ‘flying bracket’. Moore was renowned for giltwood (and gilt-gesso) furniture – but in some rare instances he signed with an incised MOORE signature – evidently he was also skilled in japanning and the 1740 inventory of Blenheim stated ‘Long Cabinet, a black lacquered table of Mr Moores’, and in the Little Round Room before the Three Cornered Room ‘a folding black lacquer table of Mr Moore's’ (BIFMO website, accessed 12 July 2022). A set of four lacquered and gilt-gesso hall chairs, almost certainly supplied by James Moore to Sir Robert Walpole for Houghton Hall, Norfolk, provides a link between the Heathcote chairs and Moore; their backs are similarly decorated in Chinese Export lacquer depicting mountainous landscapes, while the legs and aprons are of delicate gilt-gesso that can be related to the Browsholme suite (one pair: E. Lennox-Boyd, ed., Masterpieces of English Furniture: The Gerstenfeld Collection, London, 1998, pp. 105-7 and 206, no. 30; sold by the 6th Marquess of Cholmondeley, Christie’s, London, 29 March 1984, lot 103; the other pair sold by the 7th Marquess of Cholmondeley, Christie’s, London, 8 December 1994, lot 110, £106,000 including premium).
The Heathcote chairs (and by extension the Page chairs and other examples) were probably made by Moore in conjunction with his partner Gumley – and indeed Elizabeth Gumley is recorded as having supplied to William Heathcote for Hursley a ‘hang’g Glass’ on the 8 March 1721/2 at a cost of £9 and for ‘Glass’s… as p bill’ on the 10 December 1725 for the huge sum of £140 (Hampshire County Record Office, Heathcote Papers, Household and General Expenses 1718-26, 63/M84/292). Elizabeth Gumley traded with her son John Gumley until his death in 1727, and continued the business afterwards in partnership with William Turing. Several other relatively unknown makers are recorded as working at Hursley – James Hawford & Company, who traded from the ‘Blue Boar’ on Cornhill and John Howard, both of whom may have also supplied pieces to Sir Gilbert Heathcote, as well as Samuel Laverick, Cassandra Keighly, Thomas Thompson and Thomas Waghorne – although none of these, it would seem, are likely to be contenders for the authorship of these chairs.
Other examples of furniture featuring the distinctive ‘flying’ bracket include a pair of Queen Anne walnut stools which were in the 20th century collection of Sir (Richard) John Sherlock Gooch, 12th Baronet (1930-1999) of Benacre Hall, Suffolk and latterly in the celebrated collection of Peggy and David Rockefeller (sold Christie’s, New York, 9 May 2018, lot 244, $275,000 including premium). Two virtually identical stools to the Rockefeller pair, possibly from the same suite, include one which was in the collection of Colonel H.H. Aykroyd at Whixley Hall, Yorkshire circa 1950 and another sold at Christie’s, London, 7 July 1988, lot 53. A closely related walnut settee, probably en suite, was with Hotspur in 1962 (F. Davis, A Picture History, Furniture, London, 1962, fig. 127).
LACQUERED FURNITURE AND THE EAST INDIA COMPANY
This distinctive model of hall chair is closely associated with the China Trade of the East India Company. It seems probable that the backs were executed in China, for patrons connected with the Company such as Heathcote, and then mounted on japanned seats and legs in London. A closely related set of four hall chairs with lacquered backs above japanned seats and legs are decorated with the coat-of-arms of Sir Gregory Page Bt. (1668-1720), for Wricklemarsh, Kent, who, like Samuel Heathcote, was a director and later chairman of the East India Company. These chairs can be dated to circa 1714-20, and according to Adam Bowett are the earliest known datable chair with this leg design (A. Bowett, Early Georgian Furniture 1715-1740, Woodbridge, 2009, pp. 154-5 and fig. 4:16; a pair of chairs was first sold at Christie's Wricklemarsh house sale, 23-29 April 1783; and again at Christie's, London, 15 November 1990, lot 69). Page must have favored the model, as a suite of furniture with similar frames but in walnut and padouk comprising four chairs, two stools and a sofa was also supplied to him for Wricklemarsh at the same time and was later in the collection of William Hesketh Lever (1851-1925), 1st Viscount Leverhulme (sold from The Art Collections of the Late Viscount Leverhulme, Anderson Galleries, New York, 9 February 1926, lot 137). The sofa from the suite was later in the collection of the Duke and Duchess of Kent, sold Christie’s, Derby House, London, 12-14 March 1947, lot 349 and subsequently sold at Christie's, London, 22 January 2009, lot 100 (£99,650 including premium). The Page family’s links to China through the East India Company are further underlined in the set of eight Chinese Export hall chairs, dated to circa 1725-35, constructed in rosewood inlaid with the coat-of-arms of Sir Gregory Page, 2nd Bt. (1695-1775) and Kenward (for his wife Martha Kenward, whom he married in 1721) in mother-of-pearl and with mahogany seats, which are now in the Sir John Soane Museum [no.XF296] – though clearly made to European prototypes, these chairs have distinct characteristics of Chinese joinery.
A further closely-related pair of japanned armorial hall chairs feature not only the ‘flying’ brackets to the top of the legs but also the shell-centered front seatrail similar to those on the Heathcote chairs. While the coat-of-arms is no longer discernible on this pair of chairs, they were probably made for a member of the East India Company, and the red shield that remains to the center of the armorial cartouche indicates that the man for whom they were made was married to an heiress (sold Christie’s, London, 27 November 2003, lot 51). A set of sixteen chairs with the same shaped lacquered backs decorated with coats-of-arms but lacking landscapes was almost certainly supplied to Robert Child between 1715, when he was knighted, and his death in 1721. Like several other members of his immediate family, Child was closely connected to the Company and had been elected Chairman in the same year as his knighthood. The chairs, which have replaced bases (probably made in the late 18th or early 19th century), remain at Osterley today, where they were first recorded in the 1782 inventory, along with a lacquer domed coffer (also with Robert Child’s coat-of-arms) that was sold at Christie’s (London, 3 July 1997, lot 16, £32,200), the pair to which is probably now in the Gallery at Osterley.
A set of chairs of nearly identical form made entirely in pine and lacking their decoration highlights the fact that, as well as furniture being partly made in China and sent to England for finishing (as with the japanned seats and legs of the Heathcote and Page chairs), there is a history of undecorated furniture, including bureau bookcases, that was constructed in England and sent to China for lacquering (this set of chairs was formerly in the Collection of Dodi Rosekrans, sold Sotheby’s, New York, 8-9 December 2011, lot 31). It was relatively inexpensive to send undecorated furniture to China for decoration, with pieces serving as ballast in what would be ‘empty’ cargo ships leaving from England in order to take back pieces made in China for the export market (Bowett, op. cit., pp. 154-155; and A. Bowett, English Furniture from Charles II to Queen Anne, 1660-1714, Woodbridge, 2002, pp. 147-9).
THE DESIGN AND POSSIBLE MAKERS
The chairs’ distinctive ‘flying’ brackets place them in a specific group of furniture made in the early 18th century. The source of the ‘flying’ brackets is a stylistic mystery with echoes in both Chinese 17th-century furniture and the designs of Daniel Marot. In terms of function, perhaps the bracket compensated for the need to have stretchers by providing greater stability to the legs and frames. Whatever the origins, the result is an entirely unique English form. Most notable of this group which features the same distinctive ‘flying’ S-scrolled brackets, many of which are attributed to the Royal cabinet-maker James Moore (c. 1670-1726), is the celebrated Browsholme suite of furniture, originally silvered and now gilded, including at least six side chairs, two stools and a table. The suite was almost certainly supplied by James Moore to Edward Parker (d. 1728) for Browsholme Hall, Lancashire, who was a distant cousin of Sir William Heathcote’s father-in-law, Thomas Parker, Earl of Macclesfield (sold The Exceptional Sale, Christie’s, London, 7 July 2011, lot 23, £181,500 including premium).
James Moore the Elder (1670-1726) had premises 'over against the Golden Bottle in Shorts Gardens’, St. Giles-in-the-Fields and became cabinet-maker to George I and the Prince and Princess of Wales, later George II, the commissions for whom he was in partnership with John Gumley from 1714. Moore was influenced by contemporary designs from France disseminated through works such as Daniel Marot's Nouveau Livre d'Orfeverie, 1703, which included designs for silver furniture, and by the work of Jean, René and Thomas Pelletier (T. Murdoch, 'Jean, René and Thomas Pelletier, a Huguenot family of carvers and gilders in England 1682-1726 - Part I', The Burlington Magazine, November 1997, p. 738, fig. 11). In his own capacity Moore served leading members of the British aristocracy including the Duke of Chandos and the Duke and Duchess of Marlborough, who appointed him Comptroller of Works at Blenheim in 1716 as successor to Sir John Vanbrugh, and became known as the duchess’s ‘Oracle’ (C. Gilbert [ed.], Dictionary of English Furniture Makers 1660-1840, Leeds, 1986, pp. 618-9). Moore was likely the author of a pair of gilt-gesso tables made for Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough at Blenheim, which combine a scrolled bracket with a broken cabriole leg – an early iteration of the ‘flying bracket’. Moore was renowned for giltwood (and gilt-gesso) furniture – but in some rare instances he signed with an incised MOORE signature – evidently he was also skilled in japanning and the 1740 inventory of Blenheim stated ‘Long Cabinet, a black lacquered table of Mr Moores’, and in the Little Round Room before the Three Cornered Room ‘a folding black lacquer table of Mr Moore's’ (BIFMO website, accessed 12 July 2022). A set of four lacquered and gilt-gesso hall chairs, almost certainly supplied by James Moore to Sir Robert Walpole for Houghton Hall, Norfolk, provides a link between the Heathcote chairs and Moore; their backs are similarly decorated in Chinese Export lacquer depicting mountainous landscapes, while the legs and aprons are of delicate gilt-gesso that can be related to the Browsholme suite (one pair: E. Lennox-Boyd, ed., Masterpieces of English Furniture: The Gerstenfeld Collection, London, 1998, pp. 105-7 and 206, no. 30; sold by the 6th Marquess of Cholmondeley, Christie’s, London, 29 March 1984, lot 103; the other pair sold by the 7th Marquess of Cholmondeley, Christie’s, London, 8 December 1994, lot 110, £106,000 including premium).
The Heathcote chairs (and by extension the Page chairs and other examples) were probably made by Moore in conjunction with his partner Gumley – and indeed Elizabeth Gumley is recorded as having supplied to William Heathcote for Hursley a ‘hang’g Glass’ on the 8 March 1721/2 at a cost of £9 and for ‘Glass’s… as p bill’ on the 10 December 1725 for the huge sum of £140 (Hampshire County Record Office, Heathcote Papers, Household and General Expenses 1718-26, 63/M84/292). Elizabeth Gumley traded with her son John Gumley until his death in 1727, and continued the business afterwards in partnership with William Turing. Several other relatively unknown makers are recorded as working at Hursley – James Hawford & Company, who traded from the ‘Blue Boar’ on Cornhill and John Howard, both of whom may have also supplied pieces to Sir Gilbert Heathcote, as well as Samuel Laverick, Cassandra Keighly, Thomas Thompson and Thomas Waghorne – although none of these, it would seem, are likely to be contenders for the authorship of these chairs.
Other examples of furniture featuring the distinctive ‘flying’ bracket include a pair of Queen Anne walnut stools which were in the 20th century collection of Sir (Richard) John Sherlock Gooch, 12th Baronet (1930-1999) of Benacre Hall, Suffolk and latterly in the celebrated collection of Peggy and David Rockefeller (sold Christie’s, New York, 9 May 2018, lot 244, $275,000 including premium). Two virtually identical stools to the Rockefeller pair, possibly from the same suite, include one which was in the collection of Colonel H.H. Aykroyd at Whixley Hall, Yorkshire circa 1950 and another sold at Christie’s, London, 7 July 1988, lot 53. A closely related walnut settee, probably en suite, was with Hotspur in 1962 (F. Davis, A Picture History, Furniture, London, 1962, fig. 127).