AN IRISH GEORGE II MAHOGANY SIDE TABLE

The sideboard-table, with 'Venus' shell supported by Bacchic lion-paws terminating acanthus-lambrequined and columnar feet, reflects the George II 'Roman' fashion as popularised by W. Jones, The Gentleman or Builder's Companion, 1739. However its gothic flowered frieze is lapped by scalloped, fretted and water-bubbled ribbons in French 'picturesque' fashion engraved in Matthias Lock's pattern-book, Six Tables, 1744. The latter appears in a mid-18th century pier-glass design attributed to the carver Richard Cranfield; as well as on sideboard-tables from Russborough, co. Wicklow and others at Malahide Castle, Co. Dublin (The Knight of Glin and J. Peill, Irish Furniture, New Haven & London, 2007, pls. 104 and 99).
A related side table was sold anonymously, Sotheby's, London, 14 February 1992, lot 96, and another with Vitruvian frieze was sold from the Moller Collection, Thorncombe Park, Surrey, Sotheby's, London, 18 November 1993, lot 60 (£54,300). The latter was in the collection of Percival D. Griffiths, F.S.A.