Cheese stand, silver-gilt and mahogany, Paul Storr, 1809.

Plain, circular silver - gilt stand resting on four partly fluted, spherical feet with turned wooden base

The Rosalinde and Arthur Gilbert Collection on loan to the Victoria and Albert Museum, London

The arms are those of Lethbridge quartering Periam and impaling Giffard quartering Buckler, for Sir John Lethbridge (d.1815) of Sandhill Park, Somerset, who married in 1776 Dorothea, daughter of William Buckler of Boreham, Wiltshire. Sir John was created a baronet in 1804. (Schroder, 1988, p. 380)

Provenance: Sir John Lethbridge, Bart., Sandhill Park, Somerset. Lillian and Morrie A. Moss, Memphis, Tennessee. Purchased from Garrard and Company Ltd., London, 1984.

Historical significance: No other example [of this type of object] with Paul Storr's mark is known to me. (Schroder, 1988, p. 380)

Silver cheese stands are found in England as early as 1689 (Clayton, 1985A, no. 120), but they have always been rare. That plate was occassionally made specifically for that purpose, however, is clear from an entry in the Wakelin ledgers (Victoria and Albert Museum).

Sir Arthur Gilbert and his wife Rosalinde formed one of the world's great decorative art collections, including silver, mosaics, enamelled portrait miniatures and gold boxes. Arthur Gilbert donated his extraordinary collection to Britain in 1996.

LOAN:GILBERT.772-2008