This set of six chairs can be attributed to Giles Grendy as one chair has a fragment of his label. Grendy's furniture was largely designed for the middling market making him particularly appropriate for the Geffrye Museum's collections which seek to represent middle-class consumption. The form of the chairs is particularly interesting – a fashionable, urban version of a traditional ladder-back chair, itself an adaptation of Dutch chairs imported from in the seventeenth century. The chairs originally had rush seats; walnut, rush-seated chairs are frequently mentioned in the inventories of middling Londoners' parlours and dining rooms, but rarely survive with their rush seats in tact. In addition, very few surviving pieces of London furniture can be securely connected to a maker, making these chairs very significant for Furniture History.
More information
Title of artwork, date
Ladderback chairs, c. 1750
Date supported
2009
Medium and material
Walnut
Dimensions
Each: 94 x 52 x 6 cm
Grant
6821
Total cost
12054

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