Sideboard

Status

Not on view

Label Text

In February 1797, Philadelphia cabinetmaker John Aitken supplied two serpentine-front sideboards to George Washington for use in his "New Room" at Mount Vernon. The design and construction of this sideboard are remarkably similar to the single surviving Washington-owned example on display in the Mansion, suggesting it was also made in Aitken's shop.

See W-94 for the Washington-owned sideboard.

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Date1795-1800

Possible maker John Aitken (American, active 1775 - 1800)

Geography Made - United States

Medium/TechniqueMahogany, mahogany veneer, light and dark wood inlays (primary), pine, poplar (secondary)

DimensionsOverall: 37 1/8 in. x 70 1/2 in. x 27 1/4 in. (94.3 cm x 179.07 cm x 69.22 cm) Other (ends): 18 1/4 in. (46.36 cm)

Credit LinePurchase, 1966

Object numberM-2479

DescriptionSerpentine-front sideboard with drawer above a recessed two-door cabinet at center flanked by a single-door cabinet at left and a large, undivided drawer at right. Six, square, tapered legs, each with two oval paterae featuring three acorns above a pair of crossed oak leaves, stringing on their fronts and dark-wood banded cuffs on all four sides. Drawers and doors veneered with book-matched crotch mahogany and outlined with stringing and banding. Stringing along bottom front of case. Four brass bail handles and stamped oval backplates. Brass-lined escutcheons in each of the drawers and doors.

Top center drawer front solid.
Published ReferencesElizabeth Shelton, "Search Ends as G. W. Sideboard Finds Mate," The Washington Post, (Washington, D.C.), January 4, 1967.

Ruth Davidson, "In the Museums: News from Mount Vernon ," Antiques 92/2 (August 1967): 176, 178, 226.

3.) Thomas Hamilton Ormsbee, "Thomas Shearer and Sideboards," American Collector (July 1941): 10-12.

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