(Message Deleted by Poster)

Re: Monday-No Picture Here

Re: Monday

Gary Smyth



Sorry, The pic appeared in preview but didn't make it to WC post. I'm looking for a close up but cannot yet find one. I'll post when I do.

Additional information: Over 30 craftsmen spent time (totaling six years) on its parts. It was made in Italy and was ordered by a young man aged 19 at the time. It must be transported by truck as air travel was deemed to have too much vibration for its joinery. The next to last owner was married to a rich American and she stated "....too large for my house."

Re: Monday

John Veerkamp

It's unique since it's the gaudiest piece in existence. It's called "over the top"

Actually not precise, but I think you

Gary Smyth

have it. I'll keep it alive for a while, but your quotation is a decent description in the correct context.

Re: Actually not precise, but I think you

John Veerkamp

"piesta De Capo"

Whoa!  You're losing me.  By any translation

Gary Smyth

I think that you are getting further away. It's past three PM if you have the answer just blurt it out. Todays trivia is world famous. Fill in missing info please.

Re: Monday

Lee Schierer McKean, PA

Based on the ornate design style I would have to guess that it was ordered by Louis XIV for his palace as he was 6'3". For him it was probably an armoire.

Lee

Sorry, no

Re: MONDAY!  I DON'T KNOW WHAT HAPPENED

Gary Smyth

To the original question I certainly didn't mean to remove the question. Anyway as best

I can remember, what I wanted the name of the work and what was unique about this item. It was built in the 1700's. It is famous for one particular thing. It was originally British and has changed hands only several times, it was packed in a warehouse for one 70 year period during war times. It was once owned by an American heiress. It now is on the continent.

Re: MONDAY!  I DON'T KNOW WHAT HAPPENED

Don Orr

Looks like some thing I saw in the Palazzo Piti in Florence. One of the di Medici brothers homes. The tables I saw were extrmely elaborate and highly detailed marquetry done in stone. All colors and patterns of stone. Every joint was perfect. There were 2 tables done like this. Most amazing work I have ever seen.

MONDAY ANSWER (long)

Gary Smyth

John may have been first but I�m not sure. His quote �over the top� was what the agent for the sale said about the piece when last auctioned. I don�t know if that is where he was headed. Don may have gotten closer with the inlays that I could understand but did not answer the question

The cabinet is the titled Badminton cabinet. It was formerly owned by a Johnson and Johnson heir, who currently lives quite comfortably in Europe. The cabinet�s uniqueness is that it is the most expensive piece of furniture in the world. It in fact rates as one of the 20 most expensive pieces of art anywhere according to Southebys.

The Badminton Cabinet is covered in scenes rendered with amazing finesse in chunks of colored stone, a technique known as pietra dura. It measures 12 feet 8 inches tall by 7 feet 8 inches wide and includes a clock with fleurs-de-lis for numbers.

The latest seller, Barbara Piasecka Johnson, of the Johnson and Johnson Family made auction history in 1990, paying $15.1 million -- a record price until the most recent sale in 2004 for over 36 million dollars. Not a bad investment if you have it to start with. She did. The new owner is Prince Hans-Adam II, head of state of tiny Liechtenstein, the principality between Switzerland and Austria. The purchase was made for the family-owned Liechtenstein Museum in Vienna.

In the most recent sale (2004) the cabinet had three unknown bidders. Offers started at 6 million pounds ($11.5 million) and moved up in increments of $500,000. After surpassing what Johnson had paid in 1990, bidding ratcheted up by the million. The new owner �never faltered.�

Beyond the architectural statement of gilded bronze tops and stately legs, pictures almost defy description. Inlays of brilliantly colored lapis lazuli, amethyst quartz, red and green jasper and other semiprecious stones portray birds flitting among sprays of flowers and ribbons. Swags of bronze foliage are encrusted with hard-stone fruit. Lions, grotesques and satyrs appear on drawer fronts and doors. The Four Seasons are rendered in bronze, along with the coat of arms of the English aristocrat for whom the cabinet was created.

Henry Somerset, the third duke of Beaufort, was only 19 in 1726, when he passed through Florence on his grand tour of Europe. He stayed a week in Florence, Italy, and ordered the piece, making a rare private commission at the Medici workshop. The cabinet required about six years and 30 expert craftspeople, according to Christie's auction house. Documents record that the duke originally paid 500 pounds (in real money 1000 shillings), plus 94 pounds (1880 shillings), in duty. (The pound sterling only existed as a value in the early 1700�s, it was an accounting process. The pound as real value didn�t occur until later.) The cabinet is named for Badminton House, the duke's seat in Gloucestershire. The cabinet rested in relative obscurity until late 20th-century when the duke�s descendants sent it to auction to settle estate taxes. That�s when Mrs. Johnson bought it. Before that with Germany�s then Hitler's grab for art the piece was crated and came to rest in a warehouse in Vaduz, Liechtenstein, where it remained for almost 70 years.

By comparison the next highest piece of furniture I could find is Eileen Gray's the "Dragon's Chair", 1917, 27 + million dollars