This remarkable marquetry cabinet-on-stand was made in England in the late 18th century, and reflects the passion at that time for works in golden-hued satinwood veneers, inlaid with detailed and elaborate pictorial wood-inaly or marquetry. Here, the scenes on the doors depict hanging flower-baskets and the stand with a drawer in the frieze is inlaid with wreaths of foliage. The shaped cresting is likewise inlaid with crossed palms below vines and a half-medallion.

There are one or two similar pieces which might point to a maker or a single commission to which these pieces may have belonged. A satinwood marquetry secretaire bookcase-cabinet was sold at Bonham's, London, 12 July 2023, lot 24, with identical half-medallions surmounting the cornice, and with very similar marquetry inlay, possibly emanating from the same workshop.

Such masterpieces of satinwood marquetry cabinet-making were the principal achievement of the famous London cabinet-making partnership of William Ince and John Mayhew, whose business partnership - one of the longest in European cabinet-making - lasted 1758 until 1804 (see H. Roberts & C. Cator, Industry and Ingenuity: The Partnership of William Ince and John Mayhew, London, 2022 - especially figs. 77, 78, 92, 106, 499). Alternatively, an attribution might be given to John Cobb, whose essays in satinwood and marquetry are comparable here (for example the commode and pair of pedestals made by Cobb for Paul Methuen in 1772 at Corsham Court, Wiltshire, illustrated in L. Wood, Catalogue of Commodes, Leeds, 1996, fig. 75, p. 91 and the wider group of commodes in the ensuing discussion - figs. 81-91). Finally, the motif of the hanging basket, so prominent in the pair of doors of this cabinet, is a relatively unusual emblem in English marquetry of the late 18th century. It features more often as a painted motif - and this may perhaps be accounted for on the high degree of technical proficiency required to execute a convincing image in wood. A painted cabinet formerly at Shrubland Park, originally supplied to Sir William Middleton, made by George Brookshaw features a hanging basket. The same motif is found on a pair of corner cupboards at Chatsworth, possibly supplied through the agent-dealer Guillaume Gaubert who was also working in the early 1780s at Carlton House, for George Prince of Wales: Brookshaw supplied a cabinet to the Prince in 1783 described as 'An Elegant / Commode Highly finished with / a Basket of Flowers / painted in / the front of the Body... [...] £50' (L. Wood, Catalogue of Commodes, Leeds, 1996, figs. 231 & 235, pp. 244-246).

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A George III satinwood and marquetry cabinet-on-stand

In three sections, with inverted bracket-shaped cresting inlaid with palms, above a pair of doors inlaid with suspended flower baskets, enclosing two adjustable shelves and one mahogany shelf with four pigeon-holes, on a stand with a flower-inlaid frieze drawer enclosing a suede-lined writing-surface, the drawer with two divisions, on square tapering legs joined by stretchers, which join at an inverted bracket-shaped platform, on block feet

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