Important Furniture and decorative arts Page 1.

IP 1 - An Important Secretaire Bookcase of superior quality by MORRIS & Co & designed by George Jack stamped MORRIS & Co 449 OXFORD ST.W 1909 to the fall with superb inlay's throughout, canted sides, further inlay below the cornice, glazed upper section opening to reveal shaped & inlaid shelves the writing area with original leather & pigeon holes with 2 small drawers also inlaid & superb quality elongated brass hinges that hold the fall when down, flanked by a small cupboard to each side for holding file's, 2 inlaid cupboard doors below opening to reveal an adjustable shelf the whole on a shaped base. George Jack designed & made the top end inlaid pieces of the highest quality in design & manufacture that Morris & Co produced one can see in this piece a superior design mind at work, such restraint that makes this piece quite faultless in design & quality. Morris & Co furniture is extremely rare especially pieces of this type of excellence & it is in mint original condition. Circa 1909. Height 78 1/2", Depth of cornice 18 1/2", Width of cornice 50". £POA.
The last 3 images are of an almost identical variation of this secretaire bookcase which is on display at Standen a truly wonderful Vernacular house in East Grinstead designed by Phillip Webb for J.S.Beale in 1891 with many original period Arts & Crafts features & original Morris & Co furniture, fabrics & rugs & is now a showhouse for William Morris items, interiors & other wonderful originals from the Arts & Crafts Movement & original lighting by W.A.S. Benson. This fine domestic Revivalist house is now owned by the National Trust & open for viewing.

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IP 3 - A Superior Quality imaginatively designed monumental 1/4 sawn Oak Arts & Crafts sideboard made by Arthur W Simpson of Kendal one of the most important Master Craftsman from the Arts & Crafts Movement, a leading carver and designer of domestic & ecclesiastical furniture at the end of the nineteenth & beginning of the 20th century.. He was born in Highgate Kendall on December 7th 1857 in the heart of England's Lake District, during his childhood he was constantly in trouble with his father for poaching a pocket knife & cutting sticks from a Willow tree in his garden. As a child he loathed school & no sooner than his mother had dropped him at school, that he'd made his escape. He was always carving objects for friends & for favours after school hours & even took projects to bed with him thus waking up with his bed sheets filled with wood carvings. At the age of 14 Simpson was adamant he wanted to become a carver & was apprenticed to Robert Rigg a new cabinet making company who had recently opened but the work he was given was not much in the line of wood carving & when he had to make a coffin & was persuaded to help put the body into it he vowed to leave at the next opportunity. He then heard that Gillows of Lancaster were looking for an apprentice carver where he went for an interview & gained the job & started work on Monday the 4th of October 1875 where he stayed learning his trade for just under 4 years & while at Gillows he made friends with William Murry a deaf mute who worked at the same bench as Simpson whom he learned to communicate with on his fingers & learnt a great deal about cabinet making from this excellent draughtsman & shared many long walks together in their spare time. In September 1879 he left Gillows to pursue more skills & went to Leicester gaining employment with Samuel Barfield a "Master Carver" himself whom employed around 30 carvers where he stayed for 15 months & resided with his Uncle Thomas & his Auntie Lizzie Seddon.
He worked in many parts of the country before settling momentarily in Kendal, where he opened for business in 1881 at 22a Highgate. Kendall. A short lived experiment where he came into debt to the sum of £30 over a 12 month period & decided that Kendall wasn't the best place for a carver to be & on advice went to London to find work where he was employed by Osmonds. At Osmonds he felt the work they gave him would not teach him much & continued looking for work traipsing from workshop to workshop until he gained employment with William Aumonier's in Tottenham Court Road & here he met a very skilful carver called Mackie & learnt a great deal from him in the short period of 5 month's that he worked for Aumoniers. (He was let go due to work waning at Aumoniers).
Simpson was known to love walking almost as much as he loved to work with wood & it was at this point in his life after he had been made redundant at Aumoniers that he decided to walk 252 miles home to Kendall to be the best man for his cousins wedding to be held on the 31st of August 1882. After the wedding he set off in search of more work where he gained employment in Altringham for H. Faulkner Armitage although little is known of his work there it seems he stayed in Altringham until sometime in 1885 when he returned to Kendal. From 1885 he taught in local villages & from 1886 he taught classes at the Keswick School of Industrial Art while doing carving for church interiors. Also in 1886 Simpson employed his first employee 'Tom Dixon' on April 9th & therefore it must be at this point that the beginnings of what would later become "The Handicrafts" evolved although the name "The Handicrafts" wouldn't be introduced until the end of Queen Victoria's reign. In the summer of 1887 he became engaged to Jane Davidson while on holiday in the Isle of Man & they were married in March 1888. In this year he was also employing a number of craftsmen all involved with church & domestic interiors, carving & making furniture. The workshops were originally at Berry's Yard in Kendal but later moved to Queen Katherine Buildings in the Christmas of 1896 & "The Handicrafts" was not coined until 1901 when a new showroom was opened in Windermere & it was this showroom which was originally named as "The Handicrafts", the company name which would continue until the company's end in 1951 was not transferred to the workshops at Queen Katherine Buildings until 1906. Arthur Simpson made furniture to designs by C.F.A.Voysey & interior work in houses which Voysey designed, Voysey was one of the most famous & influential Architect/Designers of the Arts & Crafts Movement known for his superior architectural achievements & the incrediable simplicity of his designs. He designed from the buildings conception to everything within the building including the interiors, the furniture, metal wears, carpets, curtains, wallpapers, lighting, fireplaces right down to the salt & pepper pot on the dining table, all within the umbrella of the Arts & Crafts Movement & always impeccably dressed wearing a flamboyant Liberty cravat. Voysey designed a house for Simpson & his family called Littleholme & Simpson & Voysey became over a long period great friends yet many people were quite weary of Voysey as he was a very stern & fastidious man & many including the Simpson family stood in awe of him but Simpson whom had a very strong will, "stood in Awe of no man". Arthur Simpson's most famous interior was for Blackwell designed by another famous Architect/Designer of the period M.H.Ballie Scott, Blackwell is a beautiful property over looking Lake Windermere & Simpson did most of the internal woodwork from skirting to staircases carved panelling, doors, exposed beamwork & some furniture. The house is a monument to Ballie Scott's designs & Simpson's work. Blackwell is now open to the public & holds regular exhibitions throughout the year, it is a superb example still with its original period interior & probably the most important & complete example from the Arts & Crafts Movement in England today. Arthur Simpson was a genius with wood his precision engineering is so perfect in his work that I believe he could have made an engine from wood & it would start up & actually run, albeit for a few seconds.

Throughout this sideboard which is an Amazing Work of Art he has carved 57 florets which are so life like you can almost smell their scent even the handles are carved rosettes which your hand feels so natural to touch as you pull a drawer open or pull down the draw bridge doors at each side giving more flat surface area to serve from, the door fronts also bordered with subtle tiny rosette detailing within it & flowing foliage carving to the edges of the front & side aprons. From a plan view the front & back legs are sculptured to a curved angular shape which is accentuated at each corner of the serving area where it then bows out wonderfully to the centre of the front making room for the pine-apple shaped support below. It's twin stretchers which come together at 45 degrees also with exposed through tenons are a craftsmen's design dream. The raised back with central enclosure which will display a beautiful object, (this sideboard was probably specifically made to display a special piece for whom it was designed for) the enclosure, which imitates in some respects the entrance to a Grand Manor House, with an inscription 'M' & the date for 1917 carved into a scrolled background. To the back a raised low shelf steps up from the serving area also for displaying more objects yet still leaving a generous proportion of serving area to serve from. A stunning & superior commissioned example from a genius master craftsman who designed & made some the very best Art Furniture of The Period. Circa 1917. This piece was without doubt designed & made by Simpson because all the rest of the craftsmen were serving in the 1st world war with only Arthur & his foreman left to keep the Handicrafts ticking along.
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IP 4 - A rare & important superior quality Whatnot after a design by Phillip Webb attributed to Morris & Co, with 2 compartments to the lower part & 9 smaller compartments above, each with a turned gallery & wonderful elongated turnings to the top identical to other Whatnots he designed for Morris & Co on original brass castors. Height 5', Depth 15", Width 18". £POA. The Walnut armchair in the picture is attributed to EW Godwin & made by James Peddle in 1881, see Anglo Japanese & Aesthetic Movement chair page.
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IP 5 -Ebonised & Gilded Aesthetic Movement sideboard attributed to Bruce Talbert 1838 to 1881, he originally trained as a wood carver & later trained as an architect but his main activity was in domestic furniture design. He also designed metalwork, cast ironwork, wallpapers, carpets & textiles for many important & prestigious companies of his time. The side cabinet is very probably made by Gillows of Lancaster, they were in business from C1729 to C1900 probably the most important furniture making company of that time. Circa 1875. Numbered 1150. Height 60" Depth 1'3" Width 4'9". £POA.
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IP 6 - Large Walnut centre table in the manner of E.W.Godwin, superb quality. Length 44 1/2", Width 32". Circa 1880. £POA.
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IP - An incrediable 8' 3" tall monumental Arts & Crafts Copper & Oak mirror firmly attributed to John Pearson with all his typical work motif's i.e. the sun, the seed pods & his quite unique leaf details all hand beaten on heavy gauge copper his favoured type & his particular 'shaped cross headed rivets'. The outer edge is protected by an oak frame all original with it's complete original back. The first image is the mirror laying on it's side but of course would normally be standing upright & I have turned all the other images 90 degrees so one can see how it would stand. The last image is of an almost identical frame probably commissioned at the same time which has a Waterhouse painting in it hanging in the Lady Lever Gallery in Port Sunlight Village, Wirral. Liverpool. Circa 1890. Height 99", Depth 2 1/4", Width 53", Width of hand formed copper 4 1/4" all round. £SOLD.
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IP - Incredible Arts and Crafts Mahogany display cabinet designed by EA Taylor made by Wylie and Lochhead retailers label inside drawer. I have had an identical one with different handles & a retailers label reading Gardner and son Jamaica Street Glasgow who, like Liberty & Co retailed Wylie & Lochhead furniture. Circa 1900. SOLD.
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IP - A fantastic Aesthetic Movement 3 fold screen attributed to Collinson & Lock with decorative carved detail's to the serpentine top, carved tramline detail around each panel & 6 carved florets to the bottom of each side, tremendous hand embroided panels of birds flying & also perched on a tree in blossom. Height 58 1/2" Width fully open 70". Circa 1880. £SOLD.
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IP - Stunning Gothic Revival oak folding screen in the manner of Phillip Webb attributed to Morris & Co with hand painted leaded glass, incised decoration, architectural arched feet with superior turned gallery above. Height 4', Width Closed 27", Width Open 54", Depth of feet 18 1/2". Circa 1880. £SOLD.
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