Elements associated with New York Rococo furniture include prominent square ball-and-claw feet, scrolled banister incorporating a diamond-shaped device, deeper carving than is typically found on New England chairs, and the addition of heels on the rear legs. The latter, a practical consideration, protected walls from being damaged by the crest rail, a convention more typical of English furniture. Also of English derivation is the decorative ruffle extending above the leg to the seat rail. The presence of these motifs demonstrates a more pervasive impact from imported cabinetwork than is evident in Boston, Newport, or Philadelphia.

Technical notes: Mahogany, red gum (rear seat rail); black cherry (slip seat), eastern white pine (corner blocks), Atlantic white cedar (shims behind rear corner blocks). The vertical corner blocks are quarter round. The rear seat rail is not as deep as the shoe, and shims are fitted between the comer blocks and rail. The slip seats are cut out in the back to accommodate the placement of the corner blocks. The seat rails are tenoned through the stiles, a practice more common in Philadelphia than New York. The seat rail of B.69.23.1 is stamped VII, the rear rail penciled 2. The seat rail of B.69.23.2 is impressed VI, the rear rail penciled I.

Related examples: Kirk 1972b, p. 120, no. 144. These chairs relate to a small group with histories from Albany to New Brunswick, New Jersey (Blackburn 1976, p. 94, no. 88; Fairbanks and Bates 1981, p. 150).

Book excerpt: David B. Warren, Michael K. Brown, Elizabeth Ann Coleman, and Emily Ballew Neff. American Decorative Arts and Paintings in the Bayou Bend Collection. Houston: Princeton Univ. Press, 1988.