Object Description
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Gregory and Co. Regent Street. London. Stamped mark to a door, and no. 1479.
H W Batley attributed.
An English walnut Aesthetic Movement sideboard with a turned gallery to the upper section and acorn finials to each side, an open display shelf below with angular form, and tram line details centered with repeating circular motifs. A glazed central double display cabinet with stylized leaf decoration to the door hinges, flanked by mirror back open display areas with glazed sides, supported by two spiral turned supports with smaller turnings to the backs and finely carved scroll details to the sides. A central oblong beveled mirror to the back flanked by two C-shaped supports below with spiral turnings to the fronts and pierced circles running through both supports. The break-front lower section with central cupboard and incised floral decoration rising from Aesthetic style plant pots to the doors with brass leaf hinges and handle flanked by angular open display areas.
The base with open shelves to the center is flanked by open mirror back display areas.
Gregory and Co were makers of high-quality furniture in the Aesthetic Movement and Anglo-Japanese styles.
H W Bately trained under B J Talbert & exhibited a side chair alongside Godwin at the American World’s Fair in Philadelphia in 1876 which had a strong influence on the Herter Brothers in the US. This cabinet has the same spiral turnings and similar incised floral decoration rising from Aesthetic style plant pots as the H W Batley corner cupboard made by Gillows of Lancaster. (Last Image). Literature: Soros, Susan Weber Rediscovering H.W. Batley (1846-1932), British Aesthetic Movement Artist and Designer, Studies in the Decorative Arts, VI, no. 2 (Spring-Summer 1999), pp. 6-8.
Batley’s style fused Talbert’s Gothic Aesthetic with Godwin’s Japanese styles.
I have come across many pieces by Gregory and Co that are Aesthetic and Anglo-Japanese in period style and some do have a strong Godwin and Talbert influences.
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