Connecticut River Valley, attributed to the Francis Group of Wethersfield, Connecticut, 1760-1785, serpentine scalloped top with projecting returns, single long drawer over three box drawers, the central of which carved with partially concave fan, serpentine apron on three sides, four tall and highly curved cabriole legs, pad feet, cherry and apple primary woods, white pine, poplar, and chestnut secondaries, 33 x 37-7/8 x 22-3/4 in., case wide 32-1/4 x 19 in. deep

Provenance: Liverant and Son, Colchester, Connecticut, October 2010 (accompanied by copy of receipt); Estate of Richard and Shirley Roberts, Virginia Beach, Virginia

Note: A similar example is illustrated as "Superior" in Albert Sack's The New Fine Point of Furniture (1993), page 210, of which he says “This piece is a study in symmetry achieved in a daring composition. The contained restless movement of the cyma-curved top is successfully balanced by a well formed case with central fan and a beautiful silhouette formed by bandy curved legs and a nicely scrolled apron.”

This Queen Anne cherry and applewood scallop-top dressing table belongs to a small, distinguished group of Connecticut River Valley scallop-top furniture from the mid-18th century; a design that spread from Hartford County and Middletown north to Greenfield, Massachusetts. It relates most closely to the Francis Group, associated with Wethersfield in the 1760s and named for the flat-top high chest that descended in the Timothy Francis family, as discussed by Thomas P. and Alice K. Kugelman with Robert Lionetti in Connecticut Valley Furniture, Eliphalet Chapin and His Contemporaries, 1750-1800 (2005), pp. 62–67, cat. no. 22.

Diagnostic analysis of the Francis Group features present on this table include a small, tightly carved shell with a recess narrower than the shell itself, a double ogee side apron profile, and canted ogee knee returns applied under the apron elements the authors identify as unique to this group. Construction details align as well: cherry primary wood with eastern white pine and tulip poplar secondary woods, exposed dovetail joinery for drawer dividers and muntins, and drawer runners tenoned into the backboard.

This dressing table compares closely to two other scallop top dressing tables also published in Connecticut Valley Furniture: Cat. 33 (p. 83), which has the same scallop top layout, apron, and leg forms; and Cat. 23 (p. 65), which sold at Sotheby's, New York, NY, on January 16, 1997, lot 203 for $387,500.