A Regency mahogany serving table attributed to Gillows, the shaped rectangular top with two small drawers and a central acanthus panel in the frieze, all raised on six turned and reeded legs. English, circa 1815.
A George IV rosewood tray top table, attributed to Gillows, the rectangular top with a bracketed, volute-carved gallery, the frieze with a disguised slide in the centre and drawers in the ends, all raised upon addorsed C-scroll end supports joined by a turned stretcher and terminating in hairy paw feet with hidden castors. English, circa 1826.
Footnote: For a similar table made from mahogany see Susan Stuart, Gillows of Lancaster and London 1730-1840, Antique Collectors’ Club, Woodbridge, 2008, Vol. II, p.382, pl GG36.
A pair of mahogany circular occasional tables in the Chippendale taste, the tops with gadrooned edges, each above three groups of openwork cluster column legs, descending past triform undertiers to block feet. English, circa 1920.
An Anglo Indian rosewood barley twist gateleg table, the top of typical oval form with two drop down flaps, supported on four barley twist legs with additional hinged supporting legs, all joined by strengthened with square section stretchers. Applied with a plaque stating ‘Distinctive Furniture: Made by the Wesleyan Mission Workshop, Tumkur, Mysore State’. Anglo-Indian, circa 1900.
‘The Kingdom in a kingdom: English Methodist Mission in Mysore State 1813-1913,’ an eBook by A J Anandan, provides a comprehensive evaluation of this Mission’s activities in the princely state of Mysore. It also explores the unique nature of the relationship between the Maharajas and some of the missionaries.
A Regency mahogany centre table attributed to Gillows, the circular tilt-top with book-matched quarter veneers, raised on a reeded column with an acanthus carved flange and triangular platform base on three outswept legs. English, circa 1830.
A Louis Philippe giltwood demi-lune console table, the original shaped breche d’Alep marble top set on a frieze carved with olive branches, the four tapering stop-fluted legs joined by a double guilloche carved stretcher centred on a classic urn, regilded. French, c1840.
The kidney-shaped desk first appeared as a writing or dressing-table during the Louis XV period (1715-1774) in France before being introduced into England in the late 18th century. It evolved to incorporate drawers and often small shelves in the Sheraton period, see ‘The Cabinet Directory’ of 1803. The finest Victorian examples were made by Gillows following the design for ‘An Oak Pedestal and Kidney Table supplied to Ferguson & Co.’ in the ‘Gillows Estimate Sketch Books’ (1840). See Susan E Stuart ‘Gillows of Lancaster and London, 1730-1840,’ (ibid), Vol. I, p.339, pl. 393 for a similar walnut desk also stamped and with Bramah locks, which once belonged to the cricket writer Brian Johnston (1912-1994).