A new chronology for English walnut - veneered furniture 1670 - 1740

Magazine Antiques, June, 2002 by Adam Bowett

(1.) Robert Wemyss Symonds, English Furniture from Charles II to George II: A Full Account... (Connoisseur, London, 1929), pp. 22-166.

(2.) For the origins and early history of European cabinetmaking, see Monique Riccardi-cubitt, The Art of the Cabinet: Including a Chronological Guide to Styles (Thames and Hudson, London, 1992).

(3.) See Dictionary of English Furniture Makers, 1660-1840, ed. Geoffrey W. Beard and Christopher Gilbert (Furniture History Society, London, and W. S. Maney and Son, Leeds, 1986), pp. 109-110, 133, 571, 902.

(4.) One of these is illustrated in Adam Bowett, "London Furniture 1666-1714," The Magazine ANTIQUES, vol. 160, no. 6 (December 2001), p. 789, Pl. V.

(5.) Working dates for John Guilbaud have been determined through tax records housed in the City of Westminster Archives, London.

(6.) Symonds, English Furniture, p.98.

(7.) Ibid., p.100.

(8.) For other examples of Coxed's work, see Christopher Gilbert, Pictorial Dictionary of Marked London Furniture, 1700-1840 (Furniture History Society, London, and W. S. Maney and Son, Leeds, 1996), Figs. 232-237. The published information about John Coxed and his successors, George Coxed and Thomas Woster, is now known to be inaccurate. A detailed account of their work will be published in a forthcoming article by Adam Bowett and Laurie Lindey in Furniture History in 2003.

(9.) Symonds, English Furniture, p.98.

(10.) For more about Belchier and Old and Ody, see Dictionary of English Furniture Makers, pp. 59-60, 661-662. Examples of their works are illustrated in Gilbert, Pictorial Dictionary of Marked London Furniture, Figs. 57-73 and 699-703.

(11.) Symonds, English Furniture, p.98.

(12.) For Henry and Elizabeth Bell, see Dictionary of English Furniture Makers, p. 61, and Gilbert, Pictorial Dictionary of Marked London Furniture, Figs. 74-85. A walnut desk with thin drawer blades dated 1737 is illustrated in Richard Weymss Symonds, Veneered Walnut Furniture, 1660-1760 (John Tiranti, Lond, 1946), Pl. 48.

(13.) For Crook's carrer, sec Dictionary of English Furniture Makers, pp. 211-212. A desk-and-bookcase with thick drawer blades is illustrated in Gilbert, Pictorial Dictionary of Marked London Furniture, Fig. 262. A desk with thin drawer blades by the same maker is illustrated in Important English Furniture, Sotheby's, London, July 4, 1997, Lot 27.

(14.) Only one double-arched desk-and-bookcase dating from Queen Anne's regin is known. It signed "W. Price" and dated 1716, but the details of its construction are not recorded. It is illustrated in Important English Furniture, Decorations, and Carpets, Sotheby's, New York, October 24, 1992, Lot 400.

(15.) For English examples see Symonds, English Furniture, Fig. 31; Symonds, Veneered Walnut Furniture, Fig. 22; and Petty Macquoid and Ralph Edwards, The Dictionary of English Furniture, 2nd ed. (Country Life, London, 1954, vol. 2, pp. 36-38, Figs, 20, 23, 25.

(16.) No. 9/287, Tradesmens' bills, Lord Chamberlain's accounts (Publish Record Office, Lond).

ADAM BOWETT is a freelance historian who has published in a number of journals. His book English Furniture from Charles II to Queen Anne, 1660-1714 will be published in July.