A 19th century Renaissance Revival painted mirrored armoire, finished in a soft ivory patina with gilt and pale silver gray highlights that catch the light across every carved surface. Barley twist columns rise above fluted pedestals to Corinthian capitals, framing a tall mirrored door set with gilded rosettes, while a pierced carved top gallery of acanthus scrolls gathered around a ribbon knot crowns the cornice between two urn finials.
The carving carries quiet meaning. Acanthus, the classical emblem of enduring life, scrolls across the frieze and the drawer front below, and the ribbon knot at the crown has long stood for devotion and lasting union, a fitting emblem for a cabinet meant to keep a household's treasures. Built with traditional frame and panel construction, the interior is fitted with shelves on ratchet supports above a full width drawer in the base.
Renaissance Revival flourished through the second half of the 19th century, part of a great revival that celebrated the refined legacy of European furniture making by reviving and reinterpreting its finest forms. Cabinetmakers of the Napoleon III era embraced the architectural grandeur of the Renaissance, and painted examples carried that grandeur into lighter, more romantic interiors.
Today the ivory and gilt finish makes a graceful statement in a primary bedroom or dressing room, and it brings light and depth to an entry hall or long corridor, where the mirror doubles the glow of a chandelier.
Circa 1870s
Measures 88H x 42W x 26D
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Available at Inessa Stewart's Antiques, Dallas Design District, Dallas, Texas.