Images(2)

Dressing table

Dateca. 1740

OriginAmerica, Virginia, Eastern (probably)

MediumWalnut, yellow pine, and tulip poplar

DimensionsOH: 27 3/8"; OW: 31 1/4"; OD: 18 1/8"

Credit LineMuseum Purchase

Object number1978-86

DescriptionAppearance: Dressing table with overhanging top with molded front and side edges and rounded and notched front corners; front with one long drawer with one central escutcheon (replaced) over a flattened arched skirt with a central pendant drop; cockbeaded drawer opening; side skirts scalloped; rear skirt with a flattened arch; ogee shaped knee returns; cabriole legs and pad feet with notched backs.

Construction: Back, sides, and front skirt tenoned into legs and pegged; front rail joined to top of front legs likley with a dovetail from the top; front, side, and rear knee returns nailed to undersides of skirts and sides of legs; top nailed to top of sides and legs (evidence of missing glue blocks under top suggests nails might be later generation); drawer runners with integral drawer guides and (new) upper drawer guides nailed inside of sides to stiles; shaped vertical drawer stops nailed to inside of back near sides; cockbeading nailed inside drawer opening to edges of skirt, top rail, and stiles; drawer front and back dovetailed to sides; drawer sides and back rounded on top edges; drawer bottom with front to back oriented grain nailed in rabbet in front and to bottom of sides and back.

Woods: Walnut top, sides, drawer front, front skirt and rail, legs and knee returns; yellow pine back, drawer sides and back, drawer supports and guides, drawer stops; tulip poplar drawer bottom and strip across edge of proper left drawer support.
ProvenanceAccording to the vendor's elderly mother, this table was bought by her in or near Charlottesville, VA in the 1940s. The vendor's grandparents lived in Suffolk, Virginia and other items purchased by CW at the same time as this table had a history in the Allen-Darden-Prentis-Webb family of Suffolk.