Product Description
A classic original Thebes stool circa 1884, designed by and made for Liberty & Co. Ltd. London by either William Birch Ltd. Or B. North and Sons, High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire, England.
The stool is made of turned mahogany legs and a dyed and shaped leather seat stitched to the carcass with leather thongs. The legs have distinctive interlocking joints and each stretcher is connected to the seat by four decorative struts.
The Thebes design was inspired by domestic furniture unearthed in the Egyptian archaeological digs of the early 19th century and acquired by the British Museum between 1829 and 1835. A fragmentary stool from the XVIII Dynasty (1400-1300 BC) caught the design imagination in England and multiple interations were produced, probably spurred by the Egyptian exhibition in the newly re-erected Crystal Palace that opened in 1854.
Liberty registered their patent design No. 16673 in 1884 and included multiple variations, however this specific stool is the closest design to the Egyptian original discovered at Thebes and was produced by Leonard Wyburd, the director of Liberty’s Furnishing and Decoration Studio established in 1883.
This design of stool was highly popular for Liberty’s, so much so that it continued to be produced in multiple variations from 1884 until 1919. It is exceptionally rare, however, to be able to acquire an original untouched example.
Conservation note: This piece is entirely original, as produced. There has been some wear to the leather thongs which has been museum conserved. Otherwise all original elements are in excellent condition.
Liberty’s London and High Wycombe, England. C. 1884
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