Walnut ladder-back side chair.
Identifier
FPF144
Title
Walnut ladder-back side chair.
Date
1745-1755
Description
Walnut ladder-back side chair with upholstered seat.
Full Description
The back of this walnut side chair has a dished crest rail above four horizontal, shaped rails, or ‘rungs’, in a style commonly referred to as a ladder-back. The rails and posts are concave, i.e. curved to fit the sitter. A stuff-over and close-nailed seat with tapered sides is raised on square chamfered front legs and flared back legs, joined with peripheral stretchers; those at the front and back are higher than those at the sides. The stuff-over seat and tan leather cover with close nailing are a later replacement done in the late 19th or early 20th century.
The ladder-back is a common English vernacular chair form, possibly of Dutch origin; it is a rare example of a style transmission from vernacular to fashionable furniture (Bowett, 2009). This chair has been tentatively attributed by furniture historian Christopher Gilbert to the Clerkenwell maker, Giles Grendey (1693-1780), and this is reinforced by comparison with other Grendey chairs. For example, it is similar to a set of six walnut ladder-back chairs in Newport Church, Essex, bearing ‘a fragmentary but recognisable’ label for Giles Grendey (Jervis, 1974). Dating from c. 1750, they would originally have had rush seats. However, the Frederick Parker chair does not have mouldings on the legs and back posts like the Newport chairs, nor are its stretchers chamfered. Another set is in the Museum of the Home (9/2010-1 to -6), possibly the Newport Church set; one chair (9/2010-2) bears a partial Grendey trade label, and is stamped ‘TC’ and ‘VII’ (Jervis, 1993).
The present chair is stamped ‘RW’ on the back seat rail; this stamp appears on other seat-furniture attributed to Grendey, including a set of probably twelve chairs and a settee, of which six chairs (plus the unstamped settee) are in the Leverhulme Collection, four were acquired in 1975 by Noel Terry for Fairfax House, York, and a further pair were sold at Christie's, London, in June 1981 (Wood, 2008).
A similar chair back can be found on an earlier set of six mahogany ladder-back chairs, supplied by Elizabeth Hutt & Son of St. Paul’s Churchyard, London, in 1739 to Bowringsleigh, Devon. This is the earliest documented example of fine as opposed to vernacular English ladder-back chairs (Jervis, 1993).
The ladder-back is a common English vernacular chair form, possibly of Dutch origin; it is a rare example of a style transmission from vernacular to fashionable furniture (Bowett, 2009). This chair has been tentatively attributed by furniture historian Christopher Gilbert to the Clerkenwell maker, Giles Grendey (1693-1780), and this is reinforced by comparison with other Grendey chairs. For example, it is similar to a set of six walnut ladder-back chairs in Newport Church, Essex, bearing ‘a fragmentary but recognisable’ label for Giles Grendey (Jervis, 1974). Dating from c. 1750, they would originally have had rush seats. However, the Frederick Parker chair does not have mouldings on the legs and back posts like the Newport chairs, nor are its stretchers chamfered. Another set is in the Museum of the Home (9/2010-1 to -6), possibly the Newport Church set; one chair (9/2010-2) bears a partial Grendey trade label, and is stamped ‘TC’ and ‘VII’ (Jervis, 1993).
The present chair is stamped ‘RW’ on the back seat rail; this stamp appears on other seat-furniture attributed to Grendey, including a set of probably twelve chairs and a settee, of which six chairs (plus the unstamped settee) are in the Leverhulme Collection, four were acquired in 1975 by Noel Terry for Fairfax House, York, and a further pair were sold at Christie's, London, in June 1981 (Wood, 2008).
A similar chair back can be found on an earlier set of six mahogany ladder-back chairs, supplied by Elizabeth Hutt & Son of St. Paul’s Churchyard, London, in 1739 to Bowringsleigh, Devon. This is the earliest documented example of fine as opposed to vernacular English ladder-back chairs (Jervis, 1993).
Condition
All legs have been tipped.
There are two reinforcing metal brackets at the back of the crest rail.
There are two reinforcing metal brackets at the back of the crest rail.
Materials
Virginia walnut (juglans nigra).
Beech seat rails.
Upholstery.
Beech seat rails.
Upholstery.
Physical Dimensions
H. 97
W. 56
D. 58
W. 56
D. 58
Marks
Stamped ‘RW’ on the back of the lower horizontal rail of the chair back.
Parker Numbers
OM 5956. See Frederick Parker Archive, Box 55, FPA050. Page 150.
Provenance
Purchased by Frederick Parker & Sons on 17 December 1920 for £10.0.0.
Notes
Adam Bowett, Early Georgian Furniture 1715-1740, Antique Collectors' Club, 2009, p. 186, Plate 4:87.
Simon Jervis, ‘A Great Dealer in the Cabinet Way: Giles Grendey (1693-1780)’, Country Life, 6 June 1974, p. 1419 and fig. 4.
Simon Jervis, ‘A 1739 Suite of Seat Furniture at Bowringsleigh’, Furniture History, 1993, pp. 42-43, Figure 4.
Museum of the Home, Grendey chairs, see: Museum of the Home collections | 9/2010-2
Lucy Wood, The Upholstered Furniture in the Lady Lever Art Gallery, Yale, 2008, vol. I, no. 20, pp. 245-263.
Simon Jervis, ‘A Great Dealer in the Cabinet Way: Giles Grendey (1693-1780)’, Country Life, 6 June 1974, p. 1419 and fig. 4.
Simon Jervis, ‘A 1739 Suite of Seat Furniture at Bowringsleigh’, Furniture History, 1993, pp. 42-43, Figure 4.
Museum of the Home, Grendey chairs, see: Museum of the Home collections | 9/2010-2
Lucy Wood, The Upholstered Furniture in the Lady Lever Art Gallery, Yale, 2008, vol. I, no. 20, pp. 245-263.
