Pair of Federal Inlaid Mahogany Kidney-Shaped Card Tables

Object Details

Object Essay

Two important characteristics—shape and sturdy construction—are key in the identification of this pair of card tables as products of the Philadelphia area. The kidney-end shape with a serpentine middle was an exceedingly popular one for Philadelphia examples with straight legs. In Benjamin A. Hewitt’s study of American Federal-period card tables, he found that more than forty percent of all Philadelphia-area tables that he catalogued were made in this shape and that it was rare elsewhere. The shape was listed in the 1811 Philadelphia cabinetmakers’ price book and is considered to be a distinctly American form. Both tables have two rear leaf-edge tenons, curved rails constructed of three horizontal laminations, and other structural features that are also common in the heavily engineered work of the Delaware Valley.^{1_{See The Journeyman and Cabinetmaker’s Pennsylvania Book of Prices (Philadelphia, 1811); Hewitt et al., no. 44 and passim.}}

Although many Philadelphia-area card tables emphasize form rather than ornament, this pair is distinguished by its extensive use of patterned inlay, pictorial inlay, and inlaid stringing.^{2_{A related but less elaborate example at the Yale University Art Gallery is illustrated ibid., no. 45. See also Hornor 1935, pl. 398, for another table “from the Home of John Elliott, J., the Celebrated Looking-Glass Maker.” A list of Philadelphia straight-leg tables is included in Hewitt et al., 182.}} The center of the serpentine front is embellished with a custom-made shell; inlaid diamonds appear on the pilasters, and four inlaid rectangles of geometric stringing accentuate the front and side facades. The result is one of the most visually animated designs found on Philadelphia tables of this period.

Card tables were often made in pairs, and R. Bruce Hoadley suggests that this pair was manufactured in the same shop at the same time. He observes that the hinged rails on both tables, which allow the flyleg to move, appear to have been fashioned from the same piece of unusually slow-grown ash.^{3_{Wood analysis by R. Bruce Hoadley, Curatorial Files, Diplomatic Reception Rooms.}}

Gerald W. R. Ward

Excerpted from Clement E. Conger, et al. Treasures of State: Fine and Decorative Arts in the Diplomatic Reception Rooms of the U.S. Department of State. New York: H.N. Abrams, 1991.