In Rhode Island and Massachusetts, the bureau table was often produced with a blocked front; however, each region’s interpretation was entirely different. Massachusetts craftsmen adeptly integrated into the facade either a rounded or flattened contour, fitting it with a tablet-shaped prospect door or, on rare occasions, one with carving. The Bayou Bend table, with its carved and gilded shell, represents the fully developed form. This bureau table and a matching chest-on-chest (B.69.357) are the only extant American examples remaining en suite.

Technical notes: Mahogany; eastern white pine. The foot blocks are quarter round. The side braces pass through the rear feet. The bottom drawers rest on the case bottom. Inside the prospect door is a shelf with a cyma-shaped scalloped front repeating the base profile of the drawer immediately above it. The tops of the drawer sides are double-beaded. Below the top drawer are full dustboards. The hardware appears to be original. The drawers and dividers are consecutively numbered.

Related examples: Most closely related is a bureau table in the collection of the Honolulu Academy of Arts, which retains a fragment of what may be a cabinetmaker’s label (Sotheby’s, New York, sale 4268, June 20–23, 1979, lot 1249A). Similar tables include Antiques 99 (January 1971), p. 7; Sotheby Parke Bernet, New York, sale 3923, November 18–20, 1976, lot 1008. Bureau tables with carved prospect doors include Antiques 75 (May 1959), inside front cover; Antiques 101 (May 1972), p. 744; Christie’s, New York, sale 7526, October 24, 1992, lot 205.

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.