Panel-back armchair
Category
Furniture
Date
circa 1660 - 1680
Materials
Carved, turned and joined oak
Measurements
117 x 57 cm
Place of origin
South Yorkshire
Collection
Hardwick Hall, Derbyshire
NT 1127789
Summary
A pair to NT 1127790, an oak panel-back open armchair, South Yorkshire/Derbyshire, circa 1660 - 1680, with a scroll and foliate-carved cresting above a back panel carved with a stylized flowering plant topped by a tulip, between leaf-carved ears, with downswept arms raised on broadening and partially ring-turned arm supports, the seat encircling the arm supports, on double bobbin-turned front legs and block feet united by stretchers. -- Much of the 16th and 17th century oak at Hardwick Hall, the indigenous pieces aside, was probably purchased by the 6th Duke in the 19th century to enhance the Elizabethan feel of the property, much as his contemporary, Charles Winn of Nostell Priory, is known to have done (Westgarth, Raikes). The 6th Duke is recorded, for instance, as having bought 'oak Arm chairs' in 1846.
Provenance
By descent until, following the death of Edward William Spencer Cavendish, 10th Duke of Devonshire (1895 - 1950), Hardwick Hall and its contents were accepted by HM Treasury in part payment of death duties and transferred to the National Trust, in 1959.
References
Westgarth 2009, M. Westgarth, 'A Biographical Register of Nineteenth Century Antique and Curiosity Dealers', Regional Furniture XXIII (2009), 1 - 205 Raikes, 2003: S.Raikes. ““A cultivated eye for the antique”: Charles Winn and the enrichment of Nostell Priory in the nineteenth century.” Apollo 157.494 (2003): pp.3-8.