Armchair
Category
Furniture
Date
Unknown
Materials
Walnut upholstered in cotton and silk with silver gilt fringe
Measurements
1200 x 670 x 910 mm
Place of origin
England
Order this imageCollection
Knole, Kent
NT 129424.1
Summary
One of a pair of two English elbow chairs, walnut, c. 1685-90, with high upholstered square backs, scroll supports to arms and front legs and loose covers of eighteenth-century chintz, c.1760-80, embellished with silver tambour-work, embroidery and silver gilt fringe. The side and cross stretchers are turned and the front stretchers carved with two S-scrolls with foliage at the centre. Traces of earlier upholstery in blue and gold silk can be found beneath the present eighteenth-century loose covers. It is likely that these are the same chairs, listed in the 1799 inventory taken at the death of John Frederick, 3rd Duke of Dorset, after the Brown Gallery had been returned to its original form. This inventory lists: ‘Two elbow Walnuttree [sic] Chairs, Chintz Covers, work’d with Gold and a down cushion…’ (Slocombe 2014, p.307)
Provenance
Possibly a perquisite of office acquired by Charles Sackville, 6th Earl of Dorset in his capacity of Lord Chamberlain to William III. Knole and the majority of its furniture were accepted by HM Treasury in part payment of death duties and transferred to the National Trust in 1946.
References
Slocombe 2014: Emma Slocombe,'Ancient Furniture: The Display and Alteration of Upholstered Seat Furniture and Textiles associated with the Brown Gallery, Knole, in the Nineteenth Century', Furniture History L (2014): 297-325