The Peter Stretch arch-dial 8-day clock housed in a cherry case attributed to the joiner John Head sold at Sotheby’s this past Saturday for $348,500 (hammer price plus buyer’s premium), a sum above its high estimate of $300,000. While not a record for an American tall case clock - that belongs to another Peter Stretch … Continue reading A Rising Tide (Dial)
Month: January 2017
Chest of Drawers at Sotheby’s
The chest of drawers attributed here, but not by the auction house, to the Philadelphia joiner John Head sold at Sotheby's this past Thursday. The hammer price was $26,000. With the "buyers premium" now at 25 percent, the total price was $32,000. This was more than 2 and a half times the high estimate but … Continue reading Chest of Drawers at Sotheby’s
“To a Chest of Drawers”
In January 1990 Christie’s sold the collection of May and Howard Joynt of Alexandria, Virginia. Lot 469 was described as “A Fine William And Mary Walnut Chest Of Drawers, Pennsylvania, 1720-1740” and carried an estimate of $6,000-$9,000. On January 19th, 2017, Sotheby’s will sell the same chest now described as A Very Fine and Rare … Continue reading “To a Chest of Drawers”
“To a Clock Case of Charetre”
It wasn’t my intent to start a discussion of the clock cases documented and attributed to John Head’s shop until later this year, but to be topical I must mention this 8-day clock by Peter Stretch (1670-1746) in a black cherry case attributed to Head to be sold as lot 6054 of the E. Newbold … Continue reading “To a Clock Case of Charetre”
John Head, Joyner
In May 1999, during research on other material in the George Vaux Papers that in 1992 had been deposited at the American Philosophical Society, Jay R. Stiefel discovered an extraordinary record of the shop production and barter of goods and services of the immigrant joiner John Head (born Suffolk, England 1688 – died Philadelphia 1754.) … Continue reading John Head, Joyner
In Proportion to the Trouble 