Each chair has an interlaced heart-shaped back centering a pierced flower-head and bellflower-carved splat. The chair is further defined by an over-upholstered serpentine saddle seat which retains its original stuffing. The legs are stop-fluted and turned in the French Louis XVI style, which are the rarest form of leg in this grouping of chairs.
I acquired the set of five because of the uniqueness of the stop-fluted style leg, and also that I was totally smitten by the beauty of the heart back style and my desire to have a good showing of this as well as the square back and shield back iterations of this federal style. The Levy appraisal (shown in the images above) sums this up.
Chairs of similar form–save the rare stop-fluted leg–rea referenced in a number of places. See Dean A. Fales, Jr., Furniture at Historic Deerfield, Page 77, Ill. 143; Helen Comstock, American Furniture, No. 431; F. C. Morse, Furniture of the Olden Time, Page 205, Fig. 189; Irving Lyon, Colonial Furniture of New England, 111. 89; Bernard & S. Dean Levy, Inc., Opulence and Splendor-The New York Chair 1690 – 1830, Pgs. 32 and 33. The chair on page 33 was also advertised by Levy in Antiques Magazine, August 1977.
Height 39 in. Width 22 in. Depth:17 in.
Revised March 9, 2026 11:13pm