A GEORGE II GILTWOOD PIER MIRROR

This fruit-garlanded 'tabernacle' frame, with Ionic wave-scrolled pediment, is designed in the George II Roman fashion popularised by William Jones's Gentleman or Builder's Companion, 1739. In view of the size of the plate and therefore its value, this mirror may well be the 'Pier Glass, Gilt and Burnish'd Frame 6. 6' recorded in the 1795 Inventory in the Breakfast Room at Chirk Castle, Wrexham.

Chirk Castle was built in 1295 by the 1st Earl of March for King Edward I's chain of fortresses across Wales. It was the seat of the Myddleton family from 1595. Under Richard Myddleton (1726-1795) a series of improvements were made in the highly fashionable neoclassical taste, probably influenced by the remodelling of his first wife's ancestral home by Lord Burlington in the Palladian style. In 2004 Chirk was acquired by the National Trust and whilst much of the contents of the Public Rooms were retained, the majority of the collection was dispersed by Christie's in 21 June 2004.