In the wake of the widespread fashion for elaborate wood intarsia, inlaid ivory and pietre dure, scagliola, also called pietra di luna (moon stone) became popular as a way of imitating inlaid stone mosaics.

The scagliola technique consists of grinding down a transparent calcareous stone, such as gypsum, and mixing it with glue and natural pigments to make a paste. The colourful paste is then used to fill the cavities of a pattern carved into a base surface and can be later polished and waxed to give the finished appearance of decorative stone. The technique is less time intensive and less expensive than the creation of hardstone mosaic (commessi di pietre dure). The Della Valle family – Filippo and his sons, Pietro, Angiolo and Giuseppe – ran a successful workshop in Rome and then Livorno until 1856, specialising in scagliola landscapes and naturalistic scenes.

Marquetry in floral designs using exotic, coloured woods and ivory, a technique brought to perfection in the seventeenth century, had a revival in the nineteenth century in Italian workshops such as that of the Falcini brothers, to whom the base of this table has been attributed. This table was exhibited at the Crystal Palace Exhibition in 1851.

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. He sought to represent the history of lapidary art in his collection which included hardstone mosiacs (commessi di pietre dure) and micromosaics made with tiny glass tesserae. Gilbert acquired this table in 1975, conscious that scagliola productions were an important element in understanding the technical history of decorative stone in art and design.