The fully mature Philadelphia high chest of drawers has long been coveted as one of the American cabinetmakers’ most brilliant achievements. In England the form never realized widespread popularity, passing from fashion by the mid-eighteenth century to be succeeded by the chest-on-chest and clothespress. By contrast, in America the high chest persisted, in Philadelphia evolving into a refined, unique Rococo expression.

In his preface to The Gentleman and Cabinet-Maker’s Director, Thomas Chippendale wrote, “Of all the Arts which are either improved or ornamented by Architecture, that of CABINET-MAKING is not only the most useful and ornamental, but capable of receiving as great Assistance from it as any whatever.” The Director’s stance is ably translated in the Bayou Bend high chest, with its quarter columns, cornice, dentils, and scrolled pediment, elements corresponding to an eighteenth-century door frame. Giving contrast to its classical verticality, the series of drawers accentuating the mid-molding, the fretwork, cornice, and Late Baroque skirt rail convey a sense of horizontality. The pediment drawer favored earlier has been eliminated and replaced by an intricately pierced tympanum. The 1772 and 1786 Philadelphia price lists reveal that a fully developed high chest of drawers with “claw feet,” “leaves on the knees,” “shell drawers,” “quarter columns,” “carved work,” “dentl fret,” “scroll pedimt. head” and “shield” (cartouche) or a comparable chest-on-chest comprised the most expensive furniture forms.

Technical notes: Mahogany; mahogany (drawers), Atlantic white cedar (drawer bottoms, upper case drawer partitions, upper case backboard, pediment’s cover boards), cedar (blocks securing the pediment), southern yellow pine (lower case’s drawer runners, dividers, backboard), yellow-poplar (drawer sides and back, lower case’s medial brace, drawer side runners, dustboards, pediment backboard). The high chest is composed of three sections. The quarter columns are made up of five elements. The drawer partitions are tenoned through the dividers. The drawer fronts, with the exception of the carved drawer, are veneered and beaded. The carved drawer is solid mahogany. Throughout the high chest are full dustboards. The divider between the two top tiers of drawers extends the full depth. The crown is roofed over. The plinths and finials are added. The hardware appears to be original. One of the drawers is inscribed “block.” Luke Beckerdite suggests the carving represents a late collaboration of Bernard and Jugiez.

Related examples: The Bayou Bend high chest is believed to have been made en suite with a desk and bookcase (Comstock 1962, no. 337). The carved frieze and scrolled pediment relate to that on a desk and bookcase and two chest-on-chests in Sotheby’s, New York, sale 5295, February 2,1985, lot 1144; Hornor 1977, pl. 171; and Christie’s, New York, sale 7012, January 19–20, 1990, lot 497. A high chest labeled by Thomas Tufft (d. 1788) shares the same frieze pattern (Christie’s, New York, sale 7294, June 25, 1991, lot 276). Joseph Wharton, who is believed to have originally owned the Bayou Bend high chest, is also thought to have owned the high chest labeled by William Savery (PMA 1976, pp. 94–95, no. 75).       

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, 1998.