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Description: | The Collection formerly included a good number of Windsor chairs, as might be expected with the Parkers' close links with High Wycombe, the centre of the Windsor industry. However, in deference to the better examples in the Cotton Collection of vernacular chairs, now owned by the Geffrye Museum in nearby Shoreditch, it was decided to keep just this one, an armchair of greater than usual sophistication that would have been made for a gentry rather than a working class household. It was also probably made by a London rather than a provincial maker. As well as the frame of yew-wood, which was reserved for the best quality chairs, the use of mahogany rather than the usual elm for the waisted, saddle-shaped seat and the carving of neo-classical wheat-ears, paterae and husks on the pierced splat both mark it out as exceptional, although conforming to a small group of known examples clearly from the same workshop. These include one in a private collection; a set of four sold at Phillips on 13th June 1978; and another at Christie's South Kensington on 4th July 2002. The chair has suffered from a considerable amount of restoration, possibly as a result of a fire or some such damage. Given its comparatively high purchase price, it is likely that this was carried out before 1913, rather than by Parker's. Comparison with other chairs in the group shows us that the stretcher would originally have been of curved ‘crinoline' form. The replaced X-shaped one is both erroneously made in mahogany and is of a design found on fashionable Lowland Scottish mahogany chairs of the early nineteenth century. The under-side of the seat has also been planed flat, losing its original adzed markings, while the back legs have been crudely fitted. Although these are of the correct form and date, they could be from another chair. To hide the damage and restoration, stain and a grey substance have been used to simulate age on the underside of the seat and the whole chair given an unfortunate coat of dark varnish which may have been used to hide other imperfections. Exhibited at the British Antique Dealers' Association's Exhibition of Art Treasures at the Grafton Galleries, London, 1928, no.177. Exhibited at High Wycombe for Queen Elizabeth II visit in 1962. Additions And Alterations: Stretchers replaced; seat restored and a section of wood at the front replaced | Source: | Vads | Identifier: | http://www.vads.ac.uk/large.php?uid=9123... | Go to resource |
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chair
Four chairs, mahogany, each comprising…
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