Cabinet Door Panel
1400-1600 (made)
| Artist/Maker | |
| Place of origin |
Oak cupboard door.
Object details
| Categories | |
| Object type | |
| Materials and techniques | Oak, carving |
| Brief description | Oak cabinet door panel, iron lockplate and hinges; France; 1400-1600; From the Pugin collection for the Palace of Westminster |
| Physical description | Oak cupboard door. |
| Dimensions |
|
| Object history | One of 96 pieces of Gothic architectural decoration, chiefly of oak, consisting of panels, friezes, pilasters, etc., museum numbers 8129-1863 to 8244-1863, average dimensions 20" x 12". English, Flemish, etc., 15th and 16th centuries. Transferred to South Kensington Museum from Office of Works (RF 52/1567) These pieces were collected by Pugin and used as models by the Thames Bank Workshops for the construction of the new Palace of Westminster. Recorded in an undated (possibly c.1863, with later annotations) departmental list as: 'Cupboard door of carved oak. English (?); late 15th cent.y H. 14 in., W. 13 1/2 in. It is decorated with a hop plant on one of the branches of which a bird is perched; on the ground is another bird, and near it a butterfly. There is a wrought iron lockplate with a bolt, decorated with pierced tracery and leafy stems; also portions of two hinges of similar metal. [2411] Badly cracked: chipped. [Another entry for the panel 8207A reads:] Cupboard door of carved oak. French (?); 15th cent.y H. 13 7/8 in., W. 13 3/8 in. Decorated with a hop plant, at one side of which are two birds, the one pecking at a worm and the other at the stem of the plant; On the plain framework above is fixed a long iron hinge pierced with Gothic tracery and a similar one below . There is a space for a lock. [2350] [location] Dewsbury Cracked. Portion of the stem is missing, also portion of the lower hinge' |
| Historical context | Comparable woodwork Louvre: Dressoir OA6972 (France, Paris(?), c1500-25), see BOS, Agnes: Mobilier du Moyen Age et de la Renaissance; La collection du musee du Louvre, 2019, no. 24, p.120 ff. |
| Bibliographic reference | Atterbury, Peter, A.W.N. Pugin: Master of Gothic Revival (London: Yale University Press, 1995), p 280.
Cabinet Door Panel,
French, ca. 15th century
Oak, iron lockplate and hinges;
20x12in (50.8 x 30.5cm)
The Board of Trustees of the Victoria and Albert Museum
London
8207.1863
In the 1840s, while working on designs for the Palace of Westminster, Pugin collected samples of carved medieval woodwork and plaster casts of architectural details to use in teaching the wood and stone carvers who had been engaged for the project. For many years these pieces were stored in a hut at the Thames Bank Workshops in Westminster. In 1863 the London Board of Works donated them to the South Kensington Museum (a forerunner of the Victoria & Albert). Most of the hundred or so woodcarvings, of which this is one, survive, but the plaster casts, which numbered in the thousands, have been lost.
The combination of Pugin’s teaching skills and the availability of these examples of medieval craftsmanship encouraged the nineteenth-century carvers to produce the remarkable work in wood and stone that still adorns almost every part of the palace. It is unusual that this example is in original condition, complete with its ironwork. Ancient fragments were all too often incorporated into so-called medieval furniture by early nineteenth-century restorers and antique dealers. |
| Collection | |
| Accession number | 8207-1863 |
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| Record created | June 24, 2009 |
| Record URL |
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