Apter-Fredericks

Important 18th & 19th Century Antique Furniture

Memorable Pieces

An Outstanding & Highly Important Side Cabinet Attributed to S. Jamar
An Important George III Mahogany Library Table of Superb Colour & Quality
A Most Exceptional George III Mahogany Serpentine Fronted Chest on Chest
A Magnificent Carlton House Boulle-Inlaid Table Designed for George, The Prince of Wales, The Prince Regent,
A George III Parcel-Gilt and Painted Satinwood Pier Table
A Pair of George III Giltwood Armchairs By Thomas Chippendale
An Important Pair of Regency Period Rosewood Side Cabinets
A Pair of George III Blue John Cassolettes by Matthew Boulton
A George II Walnut Side Chair
A George III Sycamore, Tulipwood Rosewood and Marquetry Pembroke Table
An Outstanding Campana Vase in Blue John or Derbyshire Fluorspar
A Pair of Nineteenth Century Bronze and Ormolu Oil Lamps
A George III Chippendale Period Sidetable
A Rare Queen Anne Blue Japanned Bureau Cabinet
A George III Chippendale Period Carved Mahogany Commode
A Very Rare Pair of Cloisonné Cranes
Saved For The Nation
A George III Rolled Paperwork Box, decorated by Mary Earnshaw of Wakefield in 1795
A George II Period Carved Mahogany Bureau Cabinet Attributed to Giles Grendey
A George III Inlaid Occasional Table in the Manner of Pierre Langlois
A George II Period Pedestal
A Pair of George III Period Satinwood, Decorated and Parcel-Gilt Side Tables
The Spencer Perceval armchair from the Palace of Westminster
A Pierre Langlois Commode
A Pair of Robert Adam designed Giltwood Torcheres
A Rosewood and brass mounted side table by John McLean
A George III Mahogany Card Table in the Manner of Ince & Mayhew
A Jewel in the Crown of Queen Anne Furniture
An Expanding Circular Dining Table by Robert Jupe
A Fine Pair of Harewood And Inlaid Side Tables by William Gates
A Pair of Queen Anne Walnut Stools
A George II Carved Mahogany Side-table Attributed to Giles Grendey
A Very Rare Pair of Queen Anne Giltwood Border Glass Mirrors
A Regency Period Gilt, Ebonised and Decorated Wall Sconce
A Regency Period Hall Seat Attributed to George Bullock
A Pair of Georgian Dolphin 'Slab' Tables in the Manner of James Richards, after the Designs by William Kent
A George III Regency Period Convex Mirror by Thomas Fentham

The following images, taken from our archives, illustrate a small selection of pieces we have handled over the past 60 years and which have given us special pleasure and enjoyment. Either for the pieces themselves, their origins or the collections in which they have been placed.

A George III Parcel-Gilt and Painted Satinwood Pier Table (detail)

A George III Parcel-Gilt and Painted Satinwood Pier Table

Height: 2'11" 90cm
Width: 5' 8" 174cm
Depth: 24" 62cm

The semi-elliptical table features a superbly decorated satinwood top above a similarly decorated frieze. The top is veneered in satinwood and painted with naturalistic flower swags bordered by a detailed guilloche pattern. The frieze is hung with flower sprays and centered by Cupid's arrows gathered in a quiver and ribbon-tied with the flaming torch of Hymenaios (the Roman god of marriage), symbolizing the union of love and marriage. The table is supported on four stop-fluted gilt-wood legs.

The quality and originality of the decoration is exceptional and the colour of the satinwood has transformed over time and has a lustrous quality rarely seen.

English, Circa 1785

Bantry House, County Cork, Ireland

This satinwood table reflects a time when the court of George III (d.1820) was seeking to combine the Roman taste popularized in England by Robert Adam with that of the French court of Louis XVI (d.1793). The flower swags featured on the top of the table closely relate to a design for a Gobelins tapestry commissioned in 1772 to decorate the so-called Tapestry Room in the State Apartment at Osterley Park, Middlesex.

From the end of the 1770s the taste for painted decoration grew with Émigré painters having considerable influence, particularly in the use of design motifs originating from continental Europe. Apart from its aesthetic introduction of colour, painted decoration does not fade and proved to be a more cost effective method of decoration than marquetry.

The present table relates to other examples of furniture featuring very similar painted decoration with swags of ribbon-tied flowers against a satinwood reserve. This includes a pair of pier tables in the Lady Lever Art Gallery, Merseyside (see Percy MacQuoid, The Leverhulme Art Collections, 1928, vol. III, No. 377 pl. 94) and a semi-circular table that was part of a group of furniture supplied to Lord Howard de Walden by the firm of Chipcase & Lambert between 1768 and 1786 for Audley End, Suffolk (see Ralph Edwards and Percy MacQuoid, The Dictionary of English Furniture, 1954 rev. ad., 3 vols., vol. Ill, p. 300, fig. 75).