Pair of Regency Armchairs Attributed to Nicholas Morel, circa 1815

Pair of English Regency Parcel Gilt and Bronzed Armchairs attributed to Nicholas Morel, circa 1815, each with a padded-back, arms and drop-in seat covered in cut velvet and panels of horsehair, the scrolling back supports with bead and reel molding, the arms supported by winged monopodia and the sides with channeled scrolls and floral sprays, above a Vitruvian scroll frieze, centered to the front with three ribbon-tied feathers, the turned tapering baluster legs headed by square paterae and on reeded brass caps and castors, one inscribed L931, (over painted), the other inscribed L930 (some traces of white paint). 

38" H x 29" W x 34" D; seat 17" H. 

Provenance: With Temple Williams Antiques Ltd., London, circa 1966; A European Private Collection; Christie's, New York, 17 October 1997, lot 470; From a New York City Private Collection.

Literature: Temple Williams Antiques Ltd., London, 1966 advertisement (One of an important pair of Regency Drawing Room State Chairs). F. Collard, Regency Furniture, 1985, p. 137 (Temple Williams Ltd Antiques, photograph credit). 

Note: This pair of elegant bronzed and gilt-enriched bergere armchairs are designed in the French antique style promoted by Thomas Hope in his Household Furniture and Interior Decoration of 1817. Conceived as Consular Thrones, they combine Greek and Roman elements with their palm-wrapped griffin monopidia supporting arm-rests terminating in palm-flowered acroteria. Their basic pattern, with Grecian-scrolled back, palm enrichments and Vitruvian fretted raik, derives from an armchair executed around 1800 for Hope's Duchess Street mansion and illustrated in his Household Furniture and Interior Decoration, 1807, pl. LIX, no. 2. The winged arms' lion-monopodia derive from banquettes placed beneath Hope's display of Grecian vases in a Drawing Room (op.cit, pl. V). These monopodia, intended to recall the chimerical griffin, considered by poets as sacred to Apollo, the leader of the Muses of artistic inspiration on Mount Parnassus, were accompanied by Hope's griffin-tripod table described as 'A table supported by Chimaeras in bronze, similar to some limbs of ideal animals, adapted to the same purpose which have been found among the remains of Pompeia'. In 1805, the Prince Regent's 'Upholder' George Smith had adapted Hope's armchair pattern for one of his 'Library Fauteuils' issued in his Collection of Designs for Household Furniture, 1808, pl. 48. The present bergeres relate to a suite with griffin monopodia supplied in 1812 by Charles Heathcote Tatham (d.1842) for the Prince Regent's Blue Velvet Room at Carlton House, London (see Carlton House, The Past Glories of George IV's Palace, London, 1991, pl. V). These chairs are attributed to Nicholas Morel and Robert Hughes of 13 Great Marlborough Street, who served as court cabinet-makers for the Prince of Wales at Carlton House and continued to supply the Royal residences until the 1820s when Morel and George Seddon formed a partnership and provided the furniture and furnishings for Windsor Castle (G. Beard and C. Gilbert, eds., Dictionary of English Furniture Makers 1660-1840, 1986, pp.623-625). The bergeres relate to other seat furniture attributed to the Morel and Hughes partnership, in particular, a pair of bergere-chairs supplied in around 1815 for the 6th Duke of Devonshire's London mansion. This pair, which lacks the monopodia feature, appears in a watercolor of the Saloon executed in 1822 (see J. Fowler and J. Cornforth, English Decoration in the 18th Century, London, 1974, pl. VI). Four related 'very handsome bergere-chairs' with Vitruvian fretted rails were supplied by the firm in 1813 to the 2nd Marquess of Bath as part of a large suite of seat furniture for Longleat, Wiltshire (Longleat Guide Book, circa 1995, p. 25). 

Keywords: British Antique Period Furniture, Seating, Chair, Throne, State Room Furniture, Thomas Hope Style, Jacob Desmalter Style, Morel & Seddon, Living Room, Drawing Room, Royal Pavilion Style, Prince of Wales, King George IV, Prince Regent, Carlton House, Carved Wood, Chimera Wings, Winged Monopodia, Ornament, Scroll Frieze, Baluster legs, Decorative Arts