Author: Michael Chappell

In preparing the series this blog entry will now conclude, it has been great fun reviewing just the Chippendale material in my own library, and having the excuse then to top it up with the catalog for the Leeds City Museum exhibition curated and catalog penned by Adam Bowett and James Lomax, and the Metropolitan Museum’s Bulletin from earlier this year ‘Chippendale’s Director: A Manifesto of Furniture Design’, written by curator emeritus Morrison Heckscher.

Enjoyable, but as I conclude this series have to admit not entirely fulfilling. As I pointed out during this series and will now summarize still very, very many questions remain unanswered about Chippendale and while the current state of scholarship acknowledges a great debt to the late Christopher Gilbert with his researches contained within his compendious 1978 The Life and Work of Thomas Chippendale, there is not, if anything, really new to add.

What Gilbert called ‘the undiscovered years’ in Chippendale’s life pose an enormous problem in that save Chippendale’s marriage in 1747, nothing is known about his training and London life until just before the initial publication of The Gentleman & Cabinet-Maker’s Director in 1754. Gilbert, Bowett & Lomax, and Heckscher all consider the preparation of the drawings and their publication a feat that, in one fell swoop, established the primacy of Chippendale in the history of the decorative arts. How it was that Chippendale arrived at this point, from whom he received his training, and how he became such an accomplished designer no one can say. Scholarship is replete with shorthandedly conclusive statements about his excellence. When his training as a draughtsman and designer is considered, if it is considered at all, it is assumed that with his proximity to the hothouse environment of the St Martin’s Lane Academy, there were plenty of opportunities for Chippendale to have learned.

Reasonable enough, but with an output sufficiently prodigious to fill the Director, it seems unreasonable that some significant production did not precede it. Heckscher indirectly takes this issue on board, arguing as he does for the drawings in the collection of the Met to be the work of Chippendale himself and witness to Chippendale’s mastery of the pencil. Perhaps. I would though be interested to pursue the work of Chippendale’s boon companion Matthias Darly, a draughtsman of established ability whose published designs predate Chippendale’s, as a collaborator whose work might have extended considerably beyond merely that of the engraver of the plates in the Director.

As much as any other significant figure in the life of Thomas Chippendale, I would like more research given over to the life of James Rannie. What was it that brought the two of them together right at the time of the preparation and publication of the first edition of the Director? While it is assumed by scholars that its publication was, through the assistance of its subscribers, a venture that was self financed, it is also known that some of these ‘subscribers’ were only named honorifically. I suspect that Rannie provided some kind of financial surety for the publication, just as he did for the substantial expansion of Chippendale’s business, with the move to large quarters in St Martin’s Lane almost simultaneous to the publication of the Director.

I suppose the greatest occurrences in Chippendale studies in the last generation are the events surrounding the almost-sale of the contents of Dumfries House. The examination of the pieces contained in this commission provided an opportunity to consider first hand and in-depth Chippendale’s output at about the time of the issuance of the Director, and also, when looking at the items produced by Scottish craftsmen to Director designs, to consider the nature and extent of Chippendale’s influence. With all that, I can’t really say that Dumfries House went any further to elucidate Chippendale’s career up to the establishment of his shop in St Martin’s Lane. It did, though, when looking at the pieces copied from the Director but known to have been completed by other craftsmen, put paid to any notion that the execution of a Director design can then be automatically attributed to the master.

Marquetry demilune commode, attributable to Thomas Chippendale the younger, Stourhead, National Trust

In spite of the fact that the Chippendale workshop carried on in one form or another for some 40 years after the death of Thomas Chippendale the elder, little attention has been paid, even during this tercentenary year, to Thomas Chippendale the younger. Some of the workshop’s greatest commissions, including the neoclassical pieces at Harewood and Stourhead were executed under the direction of Thomas Chippendale the younger- Harewood perhaps to a lesser extent, Stourhead in its entirety. The Chippendale legacy, despite this, is something that attaches to the elder, and seems always to exist as some kind of footnote to the powerful influence of the first edition of the Director.

The why of this legacy is another aspect that seems not completely resolved, as popular passion for the fanciful rococo, with the Chinoiserie and ‘Gothick’ designs always with a heavy admixture of the rococo, was a short-lived phenomenon in Britain, from around 1740 to 1760, and certainly no later than 1770. As a fashion, it was displaced thoroughly by the classical antiquarianism of Stuart, Adam, and later, Thomas Hope, and then still later the studied English Gothic antiquarianism of Pugin.

While the various revivals of interest in Chippendale proceeded apace in the 19^th century, it is surprising that interest in his mid-18^th century contemporaries did not. William Hallett, Vile & Cobb, the Linnells, and Ince and Mayhew produced some remarkable commissions during the 18^th century, enjoying royal patronage where Chippendale did not. As well, Ince and Mayhew’s 1762 Universal System of Household Furniture was as a collection of designs considered even by Chippendale of such significance it stimulated him to revise and then reissue an updated edition of the Director.

Still and all, no one has been lionized the way Chippendale has. Although a statue of Chippendale the elder adorns the façade of the V & A, one wonders whether this might not be a reflection at least in part of the esteem in which he was held in America. At the turn of the last century, very many museums, and most notably the Metropolitan Museum in New York, were at what appears their busiest in building collections of American decorative arts, and in the course of this, sought to add a bit of sophisticated lustre to pieces that were created so far from the style centres of London and the mother country. It is known that the Director did early on find its way to colonial America, as it found its way throughout Europe. It was perhaps the attempts of curators and collectors at the time to promote the mastery of American craftsmen by linking them stylistically with Chippendale. And over time, this became amongst collectors and museums a responsive chorus, trumpeting the name of Chippendale back and forth across the Atlantic. America’s prosperity in the late 19^th and early 20^th centuries financed the ability of private and institutional collectors to bring back from England ‘authentic’ Chippendale pieces. ‘Authentic’ in quotes, as very much of what was given pride of place on this side of the pond has, over time, been shown to be shall we say of specious attribution, supported not by provenance but only by a resemblance, and often only the vaguest, to a Director design.

Collectors of all stripes and dealers in the accredited trade in art and antiques are generally now much, much more cautious in handing out attributions, and but with the welter of scholarship in this tercentenary year it is surprising one still hears the proper name ‘Chippendale’ used so frequently as an adjective. Watching the American ‘Antiques Roadshow’ experts who should know better yet describe almost any furniture piece from the 18^th or 19^th centuries as ‘Chippendale style’- or even more broadly and less accurately ‘Chippendale period’- if it is only possessed of a cabriole leg or ball and claw foot.

Gaucherie on TV is nothing new, though, but it was surprising to read Morrison Hecksher’s opinion that whoever made it, and presumably whenever it was made, if it is to a Chippendale design, any piece can ‘legitimately’ (his term) be called Chippendale. Heckscher’s rationale is derived from statements by Chippendale within the Director, that a cabinetmaker could mix or match various motifs within the book to achieve, depending on the skill of the cabinetmaker, a good and pleasing result. While on the one hand, there is no question Chippendale expected his designs would be cribbed, on the other, he did seek to strongly imply that the proper execution of his excellently rendered designs could be wrought with excellent results in his own workshop. In this respect, I am in slight disagreement with Heckscher- the primary purpose for the publication of the Director in 1754 was to promote the business of Thomas Chippendale and James Rannie.

Ex collection of LACMA- Chippendale, not!

It might be noted that pieces at one time cataloged as by Chippendale have been shall we say reassessed and then sold off by institutional collectors. The Los Angeles County Museum of Art was formerly possessed of and then several years ago sold off a large case piece that had just fairly recently been acquired and attributed to Thomas Chippendale. A more knowledgeable curator spotted the piece straightaway as a later confection cobbled together from what we in the trade call ‘period elements.’ Of course institutional collectors are biased toward their own collections and just an example or two aren’t precisely illustrative, but it does beg question whether to avoid the embarrassment of incorrect attributions, institutional collectors might be complicit to some degree in stymying advances in Chippendale scholarship.

As I consider this tercentenary year as it moves to its close there is room for very, very much more scholarship on the subject of Thomas Chippendale. For me, as for very many other people, 2018 then hopefully becomes the year in which an interest in Chippendale is not revived, but rather renewed and reinvigorated, and perhaps that renewal of interest will mark this as a time of beginning for additional scholarship and discoveries.

While we celebrate this year the tercentenary of Thomas Chippendale, it must be remembered that it is the birth of Thomas Chippendale the elder, and that his son Thomas Chippendale the younger was involved in the workshop from around 1770. Indeed, it is from information that survives from the time of the younger that we know much of what we do, particularly about the shop itself.

However, as the elder died in 1779 after a couple of years of inactivity due to ill health, it is to Thomas Chippendale the younger we must look for the inspiration, draughtsmanship, and craft that produced some of the workshops most notable productions in the last quarter of the 18^th century. After basically two centuries of inattention, there has recently at long last been significant scholarly attention paid to his work.

A bit of chronology is worth inserting here, with the work of Thomas Chippendale the elder spanning the years from circa 1750 through a few years before his death in 1779, while the tenure of the younger was significantly longer, from about 1770 until about 1821, carrying on despite the firm’s bankruptcy in 1804. Chippendale junior died in 1822.

The lack of attention paid to the younger was possibly the result of the phenomenal attention paid posthumously to the elder. Through the 19^th and 20^th centuries ‘Chippendale’ became a byword for anything in the style of the English decorative arts of roughly the middle of the 18^th century. The mid-18^th century rococo of the Director achieved a revival in the early years of the 19^th century, with the publication of John Weale’s A Collection of Ornamental Designs, with the subtitle ‘chiefly after the designs of Thomas Chippendale’. Bowett notes that despite the subtitle the book didn’t contain a single plate by Thomas Chippendale.

This revivalism continued apace through the century, with every manufacturer offering something in a traditional style that was then labeled ‘Chippendale’. What might be regarded as full-on institutional sanction came in 1905 with the installation of a full-length statue of Thomas Chippendale installed in the façade of the Victoria & Albert Museum.

Although Chippendale’s Director in various editions and reprints was widely distributed, including colonial America, it has seemed to me that American 18^th century furniture with designs derived from the Director has significantly less to do with the perpetuation of Chippendale’s innovative designs than it does with what I’d term ‘trade speak’.

With the popularity of colonial furniture styles and colonial revivalism certainly during most of the last century, American dealers and collectors have habitually referred to any case or seating piece with a cabriole leg or any chair with a fan back as ‘Chippendale’. This sort of inaccurate shorthand continues with fulsome abandon, with the American ‘Antiques Roadshow’ on PBS replete with so-called experts repeating this imprecise shorthand on every episode. This underlines the ability of less sophisticated dealers, interior designers and novice collectors to then contact members of the accredited trade in art and antiques and ask for something ‘Chippendale’. What I find frustrating, and at other times mirthful, is the long discussion this then begs when we field such an enquiry, trying to achieve shall we say intellectual common ground. Mea culpa, I am not always as patient as I should be, and in trying to suss out what it is the client is actually seeking, I suspect I am characterized, not always sub rosa, as pedantic and snotty. Or, on second thought, perhaps I have actually been from time to time caught out, with my basic nature pedantic and snotty.

Fortunately, Chippendale scholarship proceeds apace. This year’s excellent tercentenary exhibition at Leeds City Museum accompanied by a comparably excellent catalog knowledgeably weaves together disparate strands of information about his early life and career, the various editions of the Director, notable commissions, and his legacy.

Piranesi’s 1761 Antichita Romane

The death of James Rannie in 1766 came on the cusp of arguably the most productive time for the firm of Chippendale & Rannie, with the association with Robert Adam ramping up and commissions including the enormous job at Harewood in the offing.

It is interesting to consider the nature of the relationship between Adam and Chippendale, with Adam imbued with an appreciation of classical antiquity derived from his grand tour and intimate association with Giovanni Batista Piranesi.

Robert Adam’s grand tour and in particular his time in Rome and the adjacent campagna wrought a sea change from his earlier work, including Dumfries House, and he proved an adept student of Piranesi, introducing design elements with archeological accuracy. These then too were adopted by Chippendale, with neoclassicism displacing the relatively short-lived phenomenon of the rococo as what, between the 1740’s to the 1760’s, was counted as ‘modern taste’.

Plate XXX from 1762 edition of Director– neoclassical above, and rococo below

Well- sort of displaced. One looks at the 1762 edition of The Gentleman & Cabinet-Maker’s Director and finds very many plates from the two earlier editions, and based on this evidence, it appears that at least at the time of issuance, the rococo was alive and well. One does though find an increasing number of swags and festoons drawn from classical motifs amongst the rocaille, ‘Gothick’, and Chinoiserie.  Of course, it would be simplistic to assume that, like any other design innovation, the popularity of neoclassicism was not gradual in its ascent. It is worth noting that, in Chippendale and Rannie’s first great commission, that of Dumfries House in 1759, what was supplied was entirely in the rococo manner of the 1754 edition of the Director and just a short 3 years before the emergent neoclassicism of the 1762 edition.

I’ve already noted that the furniture inside Dumfries House is a bit at odds with the overall design of the house, an uneasy mixture of Burlingtonian Palladianism and the restrained rococo of the interior plasterwork, and one must assume that the Adam brothers had not much to do with fitting out the house.

This was all to change, of course, following the return of Robert Adam from his grand tour, for it was not just the antiquarianism of Piranesi, but three years of constant tutelage by Charles-Louis Clerisseau as drawing master and bear-leader that gave Adam a style and manner of architectural output that served and informed his prodigious output for the next 30 years.

Lyre and caduceus from Piranesi’s il Camp Marzio dell’Antica Roma, circa 1750

Lyre-back chair by Thos Chippendale, Nostell Priory, to an Adam design

This year is Chippendale’s tercentenary, and the naturally tendentious focus is on his design and output, but the importance of the overarching influence of Robert Adam, and by extension that of Clerisseau and particularly Piranesi might be, but should never be, overlooked. While much has been made of Chippendale’s skill and draughtsmanship in furniture design, very little output, save the Dumfries House commission, follows his patterns. Very much more was executed by Chippendale’s workshop- but to the designs of Robert Adam. The lyre back library chair from Nostell Priory is illustrated by both the late Christopher Gilbert and Adam Bowett as an example of Chippendale’s work in a neoclassical idiom, but it is also illustrated in Eileen Harris’ The Furniture of Robert Adam. That it is more firmly in Adam’s oeuvre than perhaps that of Thomas Chippendale is given weight by an examination of the design inspiration. An engraving of a lyre and caduceus in Piranesi’s Il Campo Marzo dell ’Antica Roma links not just with the splat of chairs executed by Chippendale for Nostell Priory, but also to a similar chair executed by John Linnell for Osterley Park- both major Adam commissions.

Lyre-back chair at Osterley Park, by John Linnell to an Adam design

Something that Christopher Gilbert accepted as a given is the mastery of draughtsmanship Chippendale possessed, and was particularly complimentary of how they were transferred to print in the 1754 edition of the Director when engraved by Matthias Darly. The uniformly good quality is very much marred, in his view, in subsequent editions by engravings of variable quality. It might just be that, particularly in the case of the 1762 edition of the Director, not just the engravings but the drawings from which they are derived have a hodgepodge effect, reflecting as they do not just innovative designs but those that were popular with the workshop’s customers, without regard to current fashion.

Robert Adam, design for demilune commode for Lady Derby, circa 1774, as illustrated in Eileen Harris, The Furniture of Robert Adam

The discordance between design and movables noted at Dumfries House is something of a general occurrence. Eileen Harris in writing about Adam designed furniture puts this down to the typical brief of the architect- designing exterior elevations and those of some interior walls- while the furnishing of the interior footprint was left to the client. She points out that the preponderance of furniture designed by Adam were the likes of pier mirrors and pier tables. Given their placement adjacent to and concordant with interior walls and architectural elements, these types of pieces then have an inherent character that puts them more in the brief of the architect.

With all that, the cabinetmaker that was to furnish more Adam domestic interiors than anyone else was Thomas Chippendale. This does not mean that Adam and Chippendale had what could be termed a relationship of collegial exclusivity, as a number of Adam interiors exist furnished by other workshops. Arguably one of the best Adam interiors, the Etruscan room at Osterley Park, was completed by John Linnell. It has even been suggested that Robert Adam was not a hearty proponent of Chippendale, owing to the workshop’s slow completion of commissions. It might be, as well, that between the architect and designer there was a stylistic divergence that perhaps made each wary of the other. The abundance of surface decoration in furniture to an Adam design, wrought in at times composition material applied to vernacular woods, and then elaborately painted to appear of a piece with wall and plaster treatments was certainly at odds with the preference the Chippendale workshop had for carved details wrought in exotic woods. Indeed, even the marquetry furniture at Harewood, frequently regarded as the most masterful of the suites created by the Chippendale workshop, though of a neoclassical and not rococo style, are at odds with the interiors created by Adam.

The Derby commode, as executed to an Adam design in painted decoration, at Chappell & McCullar

I don’t think anyone would argue that in his day, Adam was much, much more a style setter than was Thomas Chippendale. Adam, though, had very shortly after his death detractors who found much more if not originality than authenticity in what became the Greek revival movement in the very late 18^th and early 19^th centuries, and the stripped-down neoclassicism of Sir John Soane. So much was written at that time of Adam’s work, particularly his late work, as thin and delicately attenuated, with his passion for movement in surface decoration characterized by one early Victorian pundit as ‘frippery’.

C. 1754 trade card for Chippendale & Rannie, as reprinted in Bowett & Lomax

While it might be argued that the 1754 publication of Chippendale’s Director… was as a promotion of his cabinetmaking business a bit of commercial puffery- albeit an expensive one- that it coincided with the move to much, much larger premises bang in the middle of fashionable St Martin’s Lane begs a singular question- how was Thomas Chippendale able to afford to do both these things at once? It is generally agreed that the capital invested at this point by James Rannie, his business partner, made both possible.

Rannie was an established man of business, or at least with established connections, in Edinburgh and the adjacent port town of Leith. But what was it that drew Rannie to Chippendale and induced him to invest, or gamble really, so heavily on the cabinetmaker’s prospects?

Dumfries House, courtesy Country Life images

Christopher Gilbert concluded that Rannie was convinced the publication of the Director would vault Chippendale to fame and financial success, but it is apparent that the publication and move to St Martin’s Lane happened almost simultaneously. Unless Rannie was possessed of second sight, it seems unlikely the Director was the sole motivating factor. In any event, Rannie was hardly a sleeping partner, and the firm became Chippendale & Rannie, with the larger premises in St Martin’s Lane leased in both their names.

‘Exploded’ plans of the main rooms at Dumfries House, from the Bute archives and reprinted in Simon Green ‘Dumfries House

While Chippendale made use of his Yorkshire roots for commissions, Rannie apparently was sufficiently well connected in Scotland to acquire trade for the business. Interestingly, one of the most significant from this period was what might be termed a walk-in, in the person of William Crichton Dalrymple, the 5^th Earl of Dumfries. He visited the premises of Chippendale and Rannie in early 1759, with the object to furnish his new home nearing completion in the southwest of Scotland. Presumably time was of the essence and it appears at his visit Lord Dumfries was possessed of ‘exploded’ plans of the house, and purchased items from Chippendale and Rannie that were either already completed or were part of the business’s standard stock in trade that could be completed quickly. With the exploded plans- showing both the footprint and adjacent walls of the interior- it would have been a relatively easy matter for the firm to superimpose the furniture pieces needed- including side tables and wall mirrors- and determine size, appropriateness, and placement. Lord Dumfries’ considerable furniture order was quickly filled and shipped by Chippendale from London to Scotland in late May, 1759.

The Drawing Room, Dumfries House- much of a muchness, courtesy of Country Life images

For furniture historians, this particular commission is of importance in that it marks the most significant number of pieces known to have been produced by the workshop directly from patterns contained in the Director. Further, the pieces and their placement have remained largely unchanged and in many cases in situ from the time of their arrival providing an unequaled opportunity for the study of this earlier, rococo period of Chippendale’s production. As a bit of a sidebar, although Lord Dumfries’ use of a plan to determine what to buy and where to put it might have been expedient, the final result was, in my view, not as effective as it might have been. Though the furniture pieces individually are beautifully designed, exquisitely wrought, and wonderfully proportioned in themselves, the overall effect, particularly in the drawing room and small parlour, is of a bit too much furniture and of too large a scale for the spaces intended.

Small parlour, Dumfries House- a welter of legs; courtesy Country Life images

It is surmised that Lord Dumfries must have had some knowledge of and exposure to James Rannie through connections in Edinburgh, and although Dumfries himself was not one of the Scottish subscribers to the Director, it is thought that he was otherwise sufficiently convinced of the fashionabilty and propriety of Chippendale and his designs from his connections with other cognoscenti in matters of taste. It is known that when designing his home Dumfries sought the opinion of the preeminent arbiter of taste Richard Boyle, 3^rd Earl of Burlington and it is perhaps through Lord Burlington that Chippendale was recommended. Perhaps. A bit of a conundrum here, as although there exists an early reference to Chippendale by Burlington, Burlington was a classicist and the leading exponent of Palladianism- very much at odds with the natural forms contained in the rococo design of the furniture Chippendale was then producing. The effect of the simultaneous and seemingly disparate influences of Rannie, Chippendale, Burlington, and Lord Dumfries’ architects the Adam brothers might be considered in a future post.

There is general agreement, though, that Dumfries House was the important commission of this period and Rannie played an important part in facilitating it- though precisely how and to what extent remains yet another subject for further study.

Though the how and the why and indeed the when of Rannie’s initial involvement with Chippendale remain open questions, it is apparent that he formed an integral part of the business. The years of Rannie’s direct involvement must have begun well before the publication of the Director in 1754, and it might be surmised that Chippendale’s efforts as a draughtsman were spurred on by the promise of Rannie’s financial help to assist in publication. Though of course the list of subscribers presumes some financial support from them, some named could be purely honorific. Bowett points out that the first edition of the Director was dedicated to the Duke of Northumberland, which dedication did not, it appears, ever result in any financial reward to Chippendale.

What is certain is that Rannie remained involved until his death in 1766. The firm of Chippendale & Rannie was busy, with important commissions including those for Sir Lawrence Dundas and Sir Rowland Winn at Nostell Priory, and also included the issuance of two further editions of the Director. Busy, but perhaps not all that profitable. It is worth noting that, with Rannie’s death in 1766, the settlement of his will required the recovery of his capital in Chippendale & Rannie. This necessitated the liquidation of a substantial amount of the firm’s assets, including timber stocks, leaving Chippendale so short of cash and supplies he was nearly unable to finish larger commissions, telling one customer he had to take smaller jobs for, his words, ‘ready money’, in preference to larger ones. One is left to wonder, moreover, whether Rannie himself had concerns about the ability of the firm to carry on without his business management. His preference was clearly to have his estate withdraw his capital rather than leaving it in place in a business that was, at least ostensibly, a going concern. It interesting that fellow Scot and Rannie protégé Thomas Haig did subsequently become a partner in the firm, which then became Chippendale & Haig, with £2,000 in capital borrowed, Christopher Gilbert tells us, from James Rannie’s widow. Presumably Haig then was, for purposes of financial management, the safe pair of hands that perhaps Thomas Chippendale was not.

Thomas Chippendale was born in Otley, a market town in one of the Yorkshire dales, the son of a joiner, and indeed, part of a larger family of joiners and sawyers, with generations of family of similar experience behind him, in the same local burgh. In fact, those with the same surname and relatives of the great man existed in the community well into the 20th century. That the family was well known and presumably well respected as sawyers and joiners might account, taking advantage of his connection with this area of the West Riding, for the significant Yorkshire commissions Thomas Chippendale was ultimately able to glean.

Mid Georgian mahogany bureau bookcase, attributable to Wright & Elwick

What’s interesting, though, is that Chippendale’s prominence occurred firstly not in his home country, but in London. What brought him there? – a tedious 200 mile journey, of course, but surprising as he was without known prospects. One assumes he had learned joinery and cabinetmaking to a journeyman’s level, but this is only a presumption, as no record of his employment with any of the established London workshops exists. Indeed, there is only a tenuous record of his working with any of the established workshops in Yorkshire, though some formidable cabinet makers were working in the area at the time. As an example, the redoubtable firm of Wright and Elwick in nearby Wakefield was well established and providing furniture for the quality at the time of Chippendale’s early maturity.

So what brought him to London and why remains a mystery for Chippendale scholars. That he was very much adept as a cabinetmaker when he reached London, without any evidence to the contrary, is accepted as a given. What is known is that his initial occupation, and that for the rest of his life, was in that hotbed of design innovation in the area nearabout St Martin’s Lane. Not only were some of the best, most fashionable established workshops-cum-ateliers along this vaunted street, but it was also home to au courant artistic production.

Hogarth’s The Analysis of Beauty, 1753

In the best example of the age of reason, it was the site of the St Martin’s Lane Academy- a loose agglomeration of artists that met in a coffee house and whose ad hoc function it became to not just teach but also to espouse contemporary ideas about proper artistic production. Indeed, the man considered the founder and for many years the prime mover in the St Martin’s Lane Academy was the doughty, thoroughly English artist William Hogarth. As well as vigorously producing his ‘modern moral subjects’ like ‘The Rake’s Progress’, Hogarth sought a cerebral link between morality, the natural order and aesthetics with the publication in 1753 of The Analysis of Beauty. With the ‘C’ scroll and the ‘S’ curve as central elements, Hogarth made English the fashion for rocaille decoration that was already the rage in France.

Title page to first edition of Chippendale’s Director…, 1754, courtesy of the Victoria & Albert Museum

In this kind of hothouse environment, Chippendale must have been exposed to Hogarth and his circle, which included the French émigré Hubert Gravelot, well-known as a drawing master and for executing designs in the rococo manner. However it happened, though, Chippendale was astonishingly well equipped to prepare the designs contained in his The Gentleman & Cabinet-Maker’s Director in 1754. I have to say, I am not too happy with the last sentence, or indeed with the last paragraph and a half, as it gives very little idea of Chippendale until he emerged, fully formed as one might say, with the publication of the Director. While Chippendale says that he worked as a cabinetmaker while preparing the book, it would be surprising to find that, with the Director such an ambitious undertaking, he had much time for anything else. This assumes Chippendale’s shop and production was small, a safe assumption as nothing else is known of any commissions he completed until he later established, with the financial assistance of James Rannie, a large premises in a good situation on St Martin’s Lane. Indeed, for all Chippendale scholars, what Christopher Gilbert termed ‘the undiscovered years’ between his leaving Yorkshire and the publication of the Director are a frustratingly gaping chasm in our knowledge of the great man. While our biographical knowledge increases with Chippendale’s marriage in 1748, it is still fairly sparse and stops a long way from explaining how he was able to accomplish such an ambitious undertaking.