Live Auction 6392East & West: A Private Collection from Eaton Square & Anouska Hempel
A SET OF TWELVE ENGLISH SIMULATED BAMBOO DINING-CHAIRS
Lot 138

A SET OF TWELVE ENGLISH SIMULATED BAMBOO DINING-CHAIRS

DESIGNED BY NORRIS WAKEFIELD FOR EDWARD JAMES, CIRCA 1935

Closed2 May 2013

Price Realised

GBP 12,500

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A SET OF TWELVE ENGLISH SIMULATED BAMBOO DINING-CHAIRS
DESIGNED BY NORRIS WAKEFIELD FOR EDWARD JAMES, CIRCA 1935
Including four armchairs, one painted green and white and with inventory plaque 'M113', each with blue and white check and coral-pattern squab cushion, the side chairs each with floral grey cotton squab cushion, four with replaced backs
The armchairs: 34 in. (86.5 cm.) high; 20¾ in. (53 cm.) wide; 17¼ in. (44 cm.) deep
The side chairs: 34½ in. (87.5 cm.) high; 20¾ in. (53 cm.) wide; 17½ in. (44.5 cm.) deep (12)

Supplied by Norris Wakefield to Edward James for the Dining Room at Monkton House, West Dean Park, Sussex, in the mid-1930s.
The Edward James Collection, West Dean Park, Sussex; sold Christie's house sale, 2-3 and 6 June 1986, lot 326.

Specialist note

MONKTON HOUSE, WEST DEAN
These chairs were commissioned as part of the collections formed by Edward James (d. 1985) at Monkton House, the retreat built by Sir Edwin Lutyens in 1902 in the grounds of his parents' house at West Dean Park, Sussex, in the mid-1930s. James altered Monkton with the architect Kit Nicholson, son of William and brother of Ben, but the interiors were an extraordinary and personal combination of surrealism and 'Vogue Regency'. James created these in conjunction with Norris Wakefield, then an assistant to the Mount Street decorator Dolly Mann, who encouraged him to introduce 'bamboo' furnishings together with palm-tree ornament as part of his Surrealist enrichment of his 'magical house in the woods' (C. Aslet, 'Monkton House, West Sussex',Country Life, 12 September 1985, pp. 700-704).