POSSIBLY WRIGHT & ELWICK, CIRCA 1765

Details

A SET OF EIGHT GEORGE III SOLID MAHOGANY DINING CHAIRS
POSSIBLY WRIGHT & ELWICK, CIRCA 1765
Each with pierced back above a yellow silk damask covered seat on shell and acanthus carved legs terminating in scrolled feet, minor variations to carving; together with four George III style mahogany dining chairs, modern

Provenance

Acquired from Partridge, London.
The Irving Collection, no. DR01.

Literature

F.L. Hinckley, A Directory of Queen Anne, Early Georgian and Chippendale Furniture, New York, 1971, pl. 125, fig. 263.
Eight chairs from this set were illustrated in the Partridge Summer Exhibition Yearbook, 1990, no. 22.

Special notice

Please note this lot will be moved to Christie’s Fine Art Storage Services (CFASS in Red Hook, Brooklyn) at 5pm on the last day of the sale. Lots may not be collected during the day of their move to Christie’s Fine Art Storage Services. Please consult the Lot Collection Notice for collection information. This sheet is available from the Bidder Registration staff, Purchaser Payments or the Packing Desk and will be sent with your invoice.

Lot Essay

Eight chairs from this set were illustrated in the Partridge Summer Exhibition Yearbook, 1990, no. 22. These chairs are closely related to a set of twelve chairs at Nostell Priory, Yorkshire, which were possibly supplied by Wright & Elwick of Wakefield, and probably those recorded in the household inventories of 1806 and 1812 as '12 Mahog- Chairs and Castors'. The attribution to Wright & Elwick is based on a further set of closely related chairs thought to have been supplied by the firm to Kippax Park, Yorkshire (see Moss Harris, The English Chair, London, 1946, p. 123). Wright & Elwick were undoubtedly employed at Nostell; in a letter to Sir Rowland Winn dated 26 August 1767, Chippendale was obliged to confess why he had failed to dye some old crimson wall hangings: ‘I find it will not take a garter blue as the Ingenious Mr. Elwick said it would, I trusted his knowledge for which I am sorely vexd, it will take a dark blue and no other coloure’ (L. Boynton, N. Goodison, ‘Thomas Chippendale at Nostell Priory’, Furniture History, 1968, p. 22).

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