Rhoda and Agnes Garrett, Aesthetic Movement Cane Seated Ebonised Armchair

By Rhoda and Agnes Garrett, this armchair in ebonised beech with cane seat aligns to the Aesthetic Movement (c.1860 to c.1900), c.1880.

The chair has a circular cane seat set within a rounded seat rail, with slender turned front legs and lightly splayed feet. The arms are carried on open spindle supports, each with small rectangular block details. The back is formed with outward-splayed uprights, a curved lower rail and three vertical spindle supports beneath a broad shaped crest rail. The same turned and blocked spindle treatment is repeated on the arms, tying the back, sides and seat frame into one coherent design.

A similar armchair, without the extra lower back rail and without the splayed front legs, was supplied by Morris and Co. to Standen, East Grinstead, in 1890.* Another variation is illustrated in the Liberty Yuletide Gifts catalogue.**

The importance of the design is strengthened by its appearance in Clarence Cook’s The House Beautiful, where a closely related Garrett armchair is illustrated beside Daniel Cottier’s Anglo-Japanese two tier ebonised side table.*** Puritan Values also holds the comparative Cottier table shown in the accompanying images, making the relationship between the Garrett armchair, Cottier’s table and the wider Anglo-Japanese furnishing circle especially clear.****

References / Provenance

* Comparable armchair supplied by Morris and Co. to Standen, East Grinstead, 1890.

** Comparable variation illustrated in the Liberty Yuletide Gifts catalogue. See last image.

*** Clarence Cook, The House Beautiful: Essays on Beds and Tables, Stools and Candlesticks, Scribner, Armstrong, 1878. The illustration shows a related Garrett armchair beside Daniel Cottier’s two tier ebonised side table. See 2nd last image.

**** Comparative Daniel Cottier Anglo-Japanese two tier ebonised side table, See 3rd last image.