George IV Silhouette Portrait Miniatures by CW Chapman, 1830
A pair of George IV profile portrait miniature silhouettes, the couple with gilt highlights, each signed 'CW Chapman, 59 Oxford Street', under glass in original bird's eye maple frames, labels to the reverse 'dated 1830' and 'plate 73 in British Profile Miniaturists' by A. Mayne, Faber 1970'. 7.28 in. x 6.50 in.
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- Bird's Eye Maple - Bird's eye maple is a type of wood that is characterized by its unique, small, round eyes or spots that are scattered throughout the wood. These spots are caused by a genetic defect in the tree, and they give the wood a distinctive, swirling pattern that is highly sought after by woodworkers and furniture makers.
Bird's eye maple is harvested from the hard maple tree, which is native to Northern Europe and North America. The wood is generally pale in colour, with shades of cream, white, or light brown. The bird's eye figure is most seen in hard maple, but it can also be found in other species of maple such as the big leaf maple and silver maple, but hard maple is the most common.
It became fashionable in furniture manufacturing for use as a decorative veneer from the late 18th century to the late 19th century.
As well as furniture making, it is also used in musical instruments such as guitar, drums, and pianos and smaller decorative items such as various type of boxes such as tea caddies and in picture frames. - George Iv - George IV (1762 – 1830) was king of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and king of Hanover from 1820, until his own death in 1830. From 1811 until his accession in 1820, he served as Prince Regent during his father's final mental illness.
In English furniture design, his reign from 1811 to 1830 is known as the Regency period. - Maple - Maple, native to North America, is a dense heavy timber from light to yellow-brown in colour. It has very little distincive graining unless it is one of the variants such as birds-eye maple or burr maple, so was not used extensively for furniture in 18th and 19th century, where cabinetmakers and designers preferred timbers with more distinctive features such as mahogany, walnut, rosewood and oak.
Birds-eye maple has a seres of small spots linked by undulating lines in the grain, is highly sough and is used as a decorative veneer. Burr maple has larger and irregular grain swirls than birds-eye maple.
This item has been included into following indexes:
- silhouettes 145
