Like many interior designers, Maurice Adams was a talented self-promoter and a canny businessman. Despite being the self-professed 'originator and inventor' of the revived georgian style that he called ‘King George V’ style, when the tides of taste turned in the 1930s towards an increasingly modernist style, Adams took a pragmatic approach, abandoning his traditional style for the sleeker lines of modernism.

This cocktail cabinet shows the final stage in Adams's transition from Revivalist to Modernist. Its compact form and use of 'modern' materials such as chrome and glass, marked a radical departure from the richly figured veneers and classic shapes employed by Adams in the past. Adams's designs also underwent a dramatic reduction in scale, adjusting to the shrinking residential space offered by modern London flats.

The cabinet was conceived as part of a scheme for a ‘cocktail room’, reflecting the newly cosmopolitan age. With silver walls, an illuminated glass ceiling and furnishings in red cellulose and chromium, the room was designed to be the last word in sophistication. Other cocktail-related objects produced by Adams for this age of convenience and sociability were a built-in cocktail cupboard for the study and a streamlined cocktail bar for the kitchen.