WS 143 Squared back East Anglian Windsor armchair |
The most outstanding feature, which is not immediately obvious from this picture, are the staggered back spindles; if you look where they meet the seat you see they are not in line. The next important item to note is that the upper half could well have been made by a cabinet maker and the lower half by a turner. The overall appearance is similar to the Mendlesham chairs that appear in Dr B D Cotton’s The English Regional Chair (1990) pp.246-256. However there are some notable subtle differences - every one in Cotton's book has double top bars and none of the vertical back spindles reach all the way down to the seat board whereas this chair has a single top bar and the vertical spindles are let into the seat. One overiding feature tends to unite the Mendlesham chairs: it is the incise mark on the legs to denote where the stretchers are to be drilled and let in - those marks appear on this chair and No 142.
© William Sergeant 2019
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