Pair of chairs of 'Louis' style, part of a salon suite of which the armchair (W.4-1974) also forms a part. The chairs are mahogany and the design combines motifs fashionable under both Louis XV and Louis XVI, and also show the influence of Chippendale. The chairs have thin cabriole legs at the front, and raked, rectangular-sectioned rear legs. The back splat is carved and pierced. The seats, which are sprung, are upholstered in pink silk damask of a rococo design, outlined on the lower edge with a pink silk gimp.

Pair of chairs of 'Louis' style, part of a salon suite of which the armchair (W.4-1974) also forms a part. The chairs are mahogany and the design combines motifs fashionable under both Louis XV and Louis XVI, and also show the influence of Chippendale. The chairs have thin cabriole legs at the front, and raked, rectangular-sectioned rear legs. The legs are carved on the knees with a recessed panel with a formal, fan-headed motif against a punched ground, the carving rising no higher than the general line of the leg. The centre of each front seat rail is similarly carved with a recessed panel with crossed fronds of leaves. The backs are waisted, with a serpentine top rail supported on a short, central, pierced splat above a pierced roundel carved with an urn. The seats, which are sprung, are upholstered in pink silk damask of a rococo design, outlined on the lower edge with a pink silk gimp.

Bequeathed to the Museum by Mme Yvonne de la Cruz-Frölich, Sunningdale (See Registered Files 62/3098 on Nominal File MA/1/L8), who had first offered pieces to the Museum in 1962. On her death a group of furniture was bequeathed (Museum numbers W.2 to W.5-1974). In the correspondence on the original file, Peter Thornton noted in a memor dated 1/12/68 that the chairs 'Belonged to Patti the singer. c. 1845' This was presumably told to him by Mme Yvonne de la Cruz-Frölich. As her husband was a singer, it is possible that the history is correct, but as Adeline Patti was only born in 1843, it suggests a much later date. In 1878 she acquired a country house in Wales, Craig-y-Nos ('The Rock of Nights') in the Brecon area and it is possible that the chairs were acquired for that house, which she lived in until her death in 1919, although they may have been made for another of her houses.

The design of the chairs is similar to many produced by the large furniture manufacturers in London in the middle of the 19th century. W. Smee & Son Litd, of Finsbury Pavement, published somewhat similar designs in their Designs for Furniture in 1850 (see Edward Joy, Pictorial Dictionary of British 19th Century Furniture Design, published in Woodbridge by the Antique Collectors Club in 1977; similar designs are shown on pp. 195, 221-223). Although such designs appeared in the 1850s, the style remained current until much later in the century.

Further research may be able to establish whether W. Smee & Son used stock numbers such as are found on the underside of these chairs. Other large-scale manufacturers of furniture produced similar designs and it is not yet possible to say who might have made the set.

Such small-scale chairs were made in sets for use in drawing-rooms and boudoirs - rooms that were thought of as female spaces. Sets were produced by the thousand and retailed by the major house-furnishing firms in London and major cities throughout Britain.

These chairs and the matching armchairchair (W.4-1974) are very typical of the mass-produced furniture which was purchased by middle-class consumers in the second half of the 19th century. It is small in scale and would have been bought for a drawing-room or personal sitting-room where women’s taste dominated, perhaps with a matching sofa or chaise-longue. The donor of the pieces said that it had been owned by the singer Adelina Patti (1843-1919) and that seems quite possible. Large-scale furnishing firms such as W. Smee & Son Ltd of Finsbury Pavement, London, manufactured such suites by the thousand. These pieces are not stamped or labelled with a name but are stamped with stock numbers that may, in due course, lead to an identification of the maker.

W.5&A-1974