We have a 3 drawer, Wellington lock style chest, with what appear to be Georgian style brass pulls that have a thistle (scotch) on them. The side handles are iron, and are of a very ornate
style for the bases of the side handle that are very geometrically engraved in appearance. These side handle base plates are turned 90 degrees from square.
The top of the chest has a broader Georgian edged wood mahogany top, and basically a similar style base with no legs. Narrow folding side bars of mahogany extend out and fold over to enclose part of the front of the drawers and have a metal and brass latch to lock the chest drawers behind the narrow folding piece of wood.
It has elements of style from Georgian campaign chests(the iron side handles), the Victorian Wellington chest but with a georgian top(not typical of military chests). The overall look of the chest though is that of a scotch chest with the lockable foldovers (slide latch) and the iron side handles(typical of Georgian campaign chests).
It was purchased in the UK about 1955 in an antique shop. It appears to be mahogany (it has a swirly grain on the side pieces
and is a more solid darker mahogany on top).
And it was definitely antique when purchased.
The hardware of the hinges is handmade as far as I can tell. The drawer pulls disasemble into 3 pieces when you remove, a base , a handle and two notched screws to mount the whole thing to each drawer.
Wonder if its Georgian or Victorian or just a very confused cabinet maker? It has scotch elements for sure.
Its in really nice condition after wood restoration and a little metal cleaning but the top and sides are not banged up much at all. (I would expect some nicks and notches).
There are no identifying marks that I can find but there is what is probably
50 year old velvet liner in the drawers. It doesn't look original.
I wonder if we had the velvet carefully removed(it is in such good condition and may even be synthetic, that I can't imagine it is original).If we did, would we find evidence of the cabinet maker initials or trademark?
I'm still looking around for some pic and I'll upload them .
Anyone have any ideas as to what age this thing is? I wonder what it is worth?
Will
