Amboyna & Gilt Library Table Attributed to Morel & Seddon

Early 19th Century (c.1815) English Regency antique amboyna and gilt library table attributed to Seddon & Morel, the rectangular top set upon solid end supports with a turned, reeded and gilded stretcher and gilded foliate bun feet, decorated throughout with rich amboyna veneers and gilt gesso edging to the top and end supports. Inscribed in pencil with a sale date and.… Duke of Rutland’. An almost identical table is in the grand entrance of Buckingham Palace. Provenance: Reputedly from Belvoir Castle, seat of the Duke of Rutland. Literature: George Seddon, 1796-1857, was the grandson of George Seddon of Aldersgate Street (the largest furniture manufacturer of the 18th century). Nicholas Morel was of French extraction and a protégé of the architect Henry Holland. Under Holland’s direction he worked on the decoration of Carlton House, official London residence of the Prince of Wales. In 1827 Seddon and Morel formed a partnership to undertake the refurbishment of Windsor Castle for King George IV, with an enormous budget at that time of £200,000. Numerous examples of similar tables in this characteristic combination of amboyna and gilt are illustrated by Hugh Roberts in For the King’s Pleasure, The Furnishing and Decoration of George IV’s Apartments at Windsor Castle, London 2001, figures 309, 380, 399, 407 and 413. This commission inevitably encouraged other patrons, from the Marques of Stafford to Liverpool Town Council and the firm continued successfully until Seddon devoted himself to painting. He trained in Paris in 1841 and then travelled widely in Egypt and the Holy Land with the Pre-Raphaelite William Holman Hunt. He had a picture accepted by the Royal Academy.