A PAIR OF REGENCY BRASS-INLAID AND MOUNTED ROSEWOOD LOW OPEN BOOKCASES

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THE PROPERTY OF THE LATE LORD LEIGH AND THE STONELEIGH CHATTELS SETTLEMENT (LOTS 18 - 28) OAKLEY AT STONELEIGH George Oakley (d.1840) operated the Bond Street firm, Oakley & Co., 'Manufactory and Magazine for fashionable Furniture' which attracted the patronage of George IV when Prince of Wales and Prince Regent. Oakley also counted other distinguished patrons as his clients, working for Charles Madryll Cheere at Papworth Hall, Cambridgeshire, Thomas Baring at The Manor House, Lee, Kent, Lady Cotton, Madingley Hall, Cambridge and Edward, Lord Lascalles for Harewood House, Hanover Square, London. Oakley produced furniture for Stoneleigh between 1813-1819. Two bills addressed to J.H. Leigh Esq., dated 26 July 1813 and 3 July 1819, survive in the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust, Stratford-upon-Avon. These two documents give invaluable indications of Leigh's taste at this time, for instance the rosewood furniture, a wood Oakley specially favoured, was highly fashionable in this period. On the 1819 invoice, lot 26 is described as 'An elegant Rosewood Commode with Chiffonier top and plate glass at the back'. The other items by Oakley in this sale (lots 24-28) which have come from Stoneleigh do not feature in either of the existing bills, so presumably they relate to another body of work Oakley carried out to James Henry Leigh specification's for Stoneleigh. With no confirmatory documentation, it is likely that Oakley was commissioned by the Leighs to provide furniture for Stoneleigh between 1813-1819.

A PAIR OF REGENCY BRASS-INLAID AND MOUNTED ROSEWOOD LOW OPEN BOOKCASES

BY GEORGE OAKLEY, 1813-1819

Details

A PAIR OF REGENCY BRASS-INLAID AND MOUNTED ROSEWOOD LOW OPEN BOOKCASES
BY GEORGE OAKLEY, 1813-1819
Each with pierced anthemion three-quarter gallery, of breakfront form with plain frieze above a central section enclosing two adjustable shelves between tapering pilasters headed by sunflowered paterae, flanked by conforming end sections, with two adjustable shelves, on a moulded plinth with paw feet, one with three later shelves, with luggage label stapled to the back inscribed in ink 'No. 96 Pair of Rosewood Bookcases'
37½ in. (95.5 cm.) high; 70¼ in. (178.5 cm.) wide; 14 in. (35.5 cm.) deep (2)

Provenance

Supplied to James Henry Leigh (d. 1823) for Stoneleigh Abbey, Warwickshire by George Oakley between 1813 and 1819, and by descent.

Special notice

No VAT will be charged on the hammer price, but VAT at 15% will be added to the buyer's premium which is invoiced on a VAT inclusive basis.

Lot Essay

The Stoneleigh bookcases of black-figured rosewood have Grecian palm-flowered china-rails and are embellished with brass bas-reliefs and 'boulle' inlay in the early 19th century antique Louis Quatorze fashion to evoke the poetry deity Apollo. Golden sunflower bas-reliefs surmount their pilasters, which are inlaid with 'trompe l'oeil' flutes in altar-tripod fashion and are raised on the paws of the mythical griffin, sacred to the sun and poetry deity. Such French-fashioned furniture was a speciality of the Bond Street court cabinet-maker George Oakley (d. 1841), whose elegant rosewood bookcase, supplied in 1819, features the same patterned gallery (see lot 26).

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