DepartmentHistoric House

Library table

Maker Edward F. Caldwell & Company (1895 - 1959)

Datecirca 1917

Mediumwalnut

DimensionsOverall: 31 1/4 x 95 1/4 x 39 in. (79.4 x 241.9 x 99.1 cm)

Credit LineReynolda Estate

CopyrightPublic Domain

Object number1922.2.88

DescriptionThis Renaissance Revival walnut library table has a flat top with an elaborate molding around the sides and ends carved with an egg and dart pattern enclosing anthemions. The massive table ends are deeply carved on their outsides with large shields or blasons of the type that would frame heraldic armorials or coats of arms having a shell serving as a crest at the top of a blank oval (no armorial fills the ovals). The shields are flanked by ogee foliate curved ornaments that go from skirt to plinth and end in large rosettes. The table ends are joined near the floor by a heavy stretcher carved with ornament similar to that around the edge of the table top. A presentation drawing for the table ends remains in the Caldwell Archives held in the collection of the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum in New York City.
ProvenanceFrom 1964
Reynolda House Museum of American Art, Winston-Salem, NC, acquired in 1964. [1]

Notes:
[1] In the early 1960s Charles H. Babcock (1899-1967) gave the house and its contents to the Mary Reynolds Babcock Foundation. The house was then incorporated as a museum and collection (Reynolda House, Inc.) on December 18, 1964 with the signing of the charter at its first board meeting. The museum first opened to the public in September 1965.

Status

On view