Height: 39³/₄ in (100.97 cm)
Width: 64 in (162.56 cm)
Depth: 25¹/₄ in (64.14 cm)
One of the earliest references to desks of this type is found in an entry from the Prince of Wales' accounts in the Royal Archives which reveals an insight into a table of this form supplied by John Kerr, a favoured cabinet-maker of the Prince Regent:
‘Feb 5 1790
To a Large Elegant Sattinwood Writing table containing 15 Drawers and two Cupboards Top covered with superfine Green Cloth to rise Occasionally the whole Varnish'd and Polish'd Compleat
£20’
The account verifies the existence of such a table in the late 18th century, supplied directly to the Prince for Carlton House prior to the general release of comparative designs such as those in George Hepplewhite's The Cabinet-Maker's London Book of Prices and Thomas Sheraton's The Cabinet-Maker and Upholsterer's Drawing Book. In 1814 Rudolph Ackermann included a French fashioned writing table with rounded cartonnier section in his Repository of Arts naming it a ‘Carlton House table' and thereby implying its origins.
Knightshayes Court, Tiverton, Devon, now part of The National Trust, is a masterpiece of High Victorian architecture designed by William Burges in 1869.
H. Roberts, `The First Carlton House Table?', Furniture History Journal, 1995, pp. 124-128.
G. Hepplewhite, The Cabinet-Maker's London Book of Prices, 2nd ed., 1793, pl. 21.
T. Sheraton, The Cabinet-Maker and Upholsterer's Drawing Book, 1793, pl. 60.
P. Agius, Ackermann’s Regency Furniture & Interiors, Holland, 1984, p. 81, pl. 63.