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Dressing table. Overhanging top veneered in four panels surrounded by herringbone inner border. Thumbnail molding on front and sides. Rectangular case encloses two drawers over three drawers. All drawers with veneer surrounded with inlaid herringbone borders. U-shaped Inlay border around two top drawers. Top drawers recess directly under the top. Applied bead molding on all drawers edges except the tops of the top drawers. Bird's head-style brasses. Elaborately cut out apron centered by cyma curves flanking a plinth. Motif repeated three times across the front and then on either side. Three drop pendants at front and on each side.
dressing tables
walnut (wood)
veneer
eastern white pine (wood)
Table, Dressing
Outwardly curved cabriole legs add a zoomorphic effect to this dressing table. The curved leg form was termed the horsebone or horse leg in the early eighteenth century, and referred to as the crooked leg later in the century. Twentieth and twenty-first century furniture historians use the French term cabriole, which refers to the leg of a goat, dubbed after a popular dance step of the same name. Although the cabriole leg dates to antiquity, and appears in ancient Egyptian and Chinese furniture, it grew especially fashionable in England in the early eighteenth century. In America, the cabriole leg remained in vogue until the 1790s. This table, produced in the Boston area around the years 1730-1740, features the curved leg of the newly popular style we know today as the Queen Anne style, while retaining the deeply curving skirt, drop finials, and highly figured veneers typical of the older William and Mary style.
Unknown
United States
30 3/4 x 33 15/16 x 20 7/16 (HxWxD) (inches)
Gift of Virginia L. Hodge and Katharine D. Parry
1942.1228
Kittery Point (York county, Maine)
Maine (United States)
New England (United States) [general region]
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