Images(4)

Secretary and bookcase

Dateca. 1775

OriginEngland, London (probably)

MediumPrimary: mahogany and mahogany veneer; secondary: oak and deal.

DimensionsOH: 7'8"; OW: 3'4"; OD: 1'10"

Credit LineMuseum Purchase

Object number1959-148

DescriptionAppearance:
Secretary and bookcase with broken scrolled pediment with delicate pierced scrollwork fret tympanum; molded cornice and scrolls have dentils over a deeply carved foliate course; scrolls terminate in deeply carved foliate scrolls; bookcase contains three movable shelves enclosed by two glazed doors; doors have narrow mahogany veneered rails and stiles, molded muntins in geometric shapes with four large rectangular glazed sections with incurved corners held in place by vertical and horizontal muntins; inset brass escutcheons on both bookcase doors; lower case has appearance of six graduated cockbeaded drawers each with round bail and rosette pulls and inset brass escutcheons; top two drawer fronts combine to form secretary drawer front; lower case has a applied molding on top to contain the front and sides of the bookcase and a gadrooned edge on the front and sides of the top; ogee base molding over shaped straight bracket feet with molding around base of each foot; secretary drawer front hinged on brass quadrant hinges; writing interior has inset leather surface that spans the reverse of the drawer front to the fixed writing surface; secretary drawer interior has four pigeon holes over one long drawer over an equal sized horizontal ledger space flanked on either side by tiers of four drawers.

Construction:
Bookcase: The single board mahogany sides are dovetailed to the deal top and bottom (deal with mahogany faced front edge). The deal back frame is screwed with modern screws into rabbets in the sides top and bottom. (Original screw locations have been abandoned in sides and bottom.) Upper, lower and medial rail of the four panel back are tenoned into the stiles; upper and lower medial stiles are tenoned into the rails. Flat panels are chamfered on the back to tongue and groove join the stiles and rails. Dados in the sides spaced ¾” apart provide for 21 shelf positions for the three mahogany shelves.

Deal door rails are through-tenoned and pegged into the stiles with cross-grained mitered veneer applied to the front surface. Molded mahogany muntins, are tenoned into rails, stiles and each other. Brass butt hinges are inset in the stiles and case sides. Upper and lower sliding locks are inset in the proper right (PR) door stile and the PL door is relieved to accommodate them. The door lock is inset in the PL door stile with a matching escutcheon on the PR door stile. Door curtains are stretched between brass rods secured with hooks to the door rails (replaced).
Cornice: The side rails of the cornice frame are dovetailed and the medial rail sliding dovetailed to the front and back rails. The top (ogee) tier of the side moldings is glued to a block that is in turn glued and possibly nailed to the cornice frame. This block is miter joined to the front pediment. Immediately below it a notched block is glued to it and also to the cornice frame. Individual “dental teeth” are glued to this block which is mitered and continues across the front. The acanthus leaf carving below the dental teeth is also glued to the notched block, nailed to the cornice frame and continued across the front. At the bottom of the molding assembly, a smaller mitered ogee molding is glued to the underside of the acanthus leaf carving.

The scrolled cornice molding consists of three laminated mahogany boards which continue the molding assembly and terminate in applied carved acanthus leaf rosettes. The outer end of the scrolled cornice moldings are screwed from above to the lower molding assembly. A ¼” board, chamfered on the upper edge is screwed to the back of the scrolled cornice molding and is carved with delicate fretwork below and between the scrolled cornice moldings. The center section of the fretwork is reinforced from the back with glued carved elements matching the fretwork and screwed into the upper edge of the cornice frame.
Two pocked screws on each side rail secure the cornice to the bookcase top.

Secretary: The single board mahogany sides are dovetailed into the two board deal bottom and into the multi-board deal top. A mitered mahogany molding is nailed and glued to the upper surface of the top that butt joins the bookcase and holds it in place. The inside edges of the molding are slightly slanted to receive the corresponding edges of the bookcase. The surface of the top in front of the molding is veneered with figured mahogany and edged on the front and sides with cross-grained mahogany. The gadrooned mahogany waist molding is nailed and glued to the proper right edge of the top and glued to the front and proper left edge.

The oak drawer blades are faced with mahogany. The ¾” deal dust board for the desk blade is glued to the back edge of the blade. The almost full depth dust boards for the lower drawers are butt joined and glued to the back edge of the drawer blades and supported underneath with triangular glue blocks. The lower drawer dust boards are ¼” with ½” x 2½” horizontally grained support strips glued to the underside on each side. The drawer blade/dust boards (with support strips) are set in ¾” dados in the sides. The dust board under the desk drawer and the one immediately below it have two 1” x 2” notches cut out at the back. Drawer stops are glued to the drawer blades on each side ¾” behind the front edge.

The two horizontal deal back boards are nailed into rabbets in the top and sides and nailed to the edge of the bottom.

The front and side mitered bottom moldings extend 2” under the bottom and are glued to it. Triangular corner blocks are glued to the bottom at the intersection at each of the four corners creating a platform under which the composite stacked block functional feet are glued. Mitered front bracket feet, probably joined with mitered blind dovetails, are glued to the underside of the molding and to the composite feet as well as to shaped glue blocks that extend the length of the returns. Mitered moldings are glued to the bottom surface of the bracket feet. The rear facing utilitarian bracket feet are half-blind dovetailed to the side facing bracket foot.

Drawers are of dovetail construction with side to side grained bottoms rabbeted on the front and side edges and set in dados and nailed from the underside to the edge of the back. Front rabbet is formed by the addition of an oak trip glued to the back of the drawer front at the bottom edge. Small cove moldings are glued inside the drawers at the intersection of the sides and bottoms. Drawers are faced with mahogany veneer and cock-beaded.

Desk: The ¾” bottom of the secretary drawer is comprised of a deal board with thin oak strips glued to the underside around the edges of the sides and front and possibly back. The deal and oak bottom is dovetailed to the drawer sides. Those elements are rabbeted and notched at the front respectively to receive the drawer front when hinged open. The drawer bottom provides both a fixed writing surface and a floor for the interior drawers. The fixed surface is joined to the mahogany fallboard with inset quadrant hinges with the lower scissor hinge component hidden with mahogany inserts. The glued leather central writing surface, which bridges the fixed surface and drawer front is framed by cross-grained mahogany veneer. The two false drawer facades are mahogany veneered and framed with molding to match the cock-beading of the lower drawers.

The desk’s open central compartment and the surface under the runners of the two bottom side drawers are veneered with side-to-side grained mahogany. The oak secretary drawer top is dovetailed to the upper edges of its sides and its front edge is faced with c.¼” mahogany. The full depth oak dust boards of the interior side drawers are faced with 1/4” mahogany. Vertical drawer and pigeon hole dividers are grainy mahogany faced with ¼” finer, varnished mahogany. Drawer supports for the wide central drawer are set in dados in the drawer dividers. Drawer blades, dust boards and dividers are set in dados in the sides, writing surface, compartment top and each other.

Desk drawers are mahogany with mahogany veneer on the front panels. The drawers are of dovetail construction with side-to-side grained bottoms glued into rabbets in the front and sides and to the underside of the back. Mitered runners are glued into the rabbets and to the bottoms on the front and sides, securing the bottoms between the rabbets and the runners.
Label TextThe option for a secretary drawer fitted out with pigeon holes and drawers like a slant front desk interior allowed cabinetmakers to create furniture forms that could be used as a desk but did not at first glance look like one. One could have a secretary drawer in a library bookcase, a chest-on-chest, a cabinet or clothespress, or in a chest of drawers perhaps with a bookcase on top like in this example. Glazed bookcases were normally fitted with interior curtains in the eighteenth century, probably in order to present a neat appearance when the doors were closed and to protect the valuable books from light damage. Green silk was the textile of choice for such curtains.
ProvenanceEx Coll:
Geoffrey Blackwell
Robert W. Symonds