Card Table

Charles-Honoré Lannuier (1779-1819), New York, NY
Date: c. 1817
Maker: Charles-Honoré Lannuier (1779-1819), New York, NY
Dimensions: 29 3/8 H x 36 W (closed) 17 13/16 D
Materials: Mahogany, mahogany veneers, ash, cherry, eastern white pine, yellow poplar, cut brass inlays, ormolu mounts, brass casters and vert antique
Marks:

Partial label on underside of top: [first five lines missing]/New-York./Hre Lannuier/Ebéniste de Paris,/Tient Fabrique &/Magasin de Meubles/les plus à la Mode,/New-York.; Incised on inside: I

Credit: Gift of Stephen Van Rensselaer Crosby
Accession Number: 1957.70.8.1
Comments:

At the time this table was made, card playing was popular and French styles in furniture and furnishings were in vogue. The maker, Charles-Honoré Lannuier, was a French émigré who brought with him an excellent knowledge of current fashions and contacts in the Parish trades who supplied him with superior decorative elements for his furniture. Looking like a small pier table, this table features a prominent winged caryatid (a figural support) holding up the table top. The superior quality of materials used, and the elaborate decoration, suggest that this table was intended mainly as ornamental rather than simply as a functional playing surface. In creating these dramatic and ornamental card tables, Lannuier drew on his knowledge of French designs and also showed that he could embellish a basically English form—the card table—to create a uniquely American expression.