Desk Maker: Unknown

1720–1730

American Decorative Arts

By appointment, Hume Furniture Study

Desks were first produced on the Eastern Seaboard about 1720. Sometimes topped by a bookcase, slant-front desks have an interior fitted with pigeonholes, drawers, and frequently a secret compartment for small valuable items. This form remained in fashion until the end of the eighteenth century. This mahogany desk exemplifies the rich, baroque style of the Delaware River Valley.

Medium

Mahogany, eastern white pine, yellow poplar, and red gum or black gum

Dimensions

3 15/16 × 40 1/4 × 21 13/16 in. (10 × 102.2 × 55.4 cm)
other (Case): 38 3/4 × 20 7/8 in. (98.4 × 53 cm)

Credit Line

Mabel Brady Garvan Collection

Accession Number

1930.2323

Geography

Made in Pennsylvania

Culture

American

Period

18th century

Classification

Furniture

Disclaimer

Note: This electronic record was created from historic documentation that does not necessarily reflect the Yale University Art Gallery’s complete or current knowledge about the object. Review and updating of records is ongoing.

Provenance
Jacob Margolis, New York; by sale in 1929 to Francis P. Garvan, New York. Gift in 1930 to Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, Conn.
Bibliography
  • Gerald W. R. Ward, American Case Furniture in the Mabel Brady Garvan and Other Collections at Yale University (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Art Gallery, 1988), 289, 292, 294–95, no. 152, ill
Object copyright
No Copyright - United States
Additional information

Object/Work type

desks

Inscriptions

There are original shop marks in white chalk and later shop notations in pencil. There are numbers in white chalk on the outside of the right side of the bottom drawer in the left side of the desk interior.

Technical metadata and APIs

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Open in Mirador

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