The Bureau Table in America

Abstract

TI e popularity and use of the bureau table in America spans the entire second half of the eighteenth century.' Even before the London craftsman Thomas Chippendale published the form among his first collection of designs for household furniture in The Gentleman and Cabinet-Maker's Director of 1754 (Plates LXI and LXII), Americans knew of the bureau table and few already owned examples. The use of the term Buroe Table in printed list comprising a Variety of Choice Household Furniture sold by Benjamin Church of Boston at Public Vendue in 1753 reveals that the form was then familiar enough in the city to require no explanation or description.2 In his first edition of the Director, Chippendale illustrates four designs for Buroe Tables. These are accompanied by an explanation referring to the form as a Bureau Dressing-Table. Two of the designs, together forming Plate LXI, are of simple rectilinear style3 (Fig. 1). This type, fitted with wide drawer above several narrow drawers flanking central recessed cupboard, became popular in America in the early 1760's and remained so until the end of the century (Fig. 2). Cabinetmakers introduced the bureau table in England in the early 1720's. The mention of buerow tables in an advertisement that appeared in the Daily Post of London for January 4, 1727, is, apparently, one of the earliest published references to the form in the city of its origin.4 By mid-century English cabinetmakers had developed the bureau table to the extent that many pieces served dual purpose. The basic design, which is that of dressing table, usually includes drawer fitted with compartments and boxes of varying sizes and central, hinged looking glass. A variation of the design permits access to the compartments and boxes by raising the top of the table. In 1762 the London cabinetmaking firm of Ince and Mayhew published patterns for closely related pieces in their folio-size design book, The Universal System of Household Furniture.5