The Gentleman and Cabinet-Maker's Director (1762): Art, History and Details

The Gentleman and Cabinet-Maker's Director (1762) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is Thomas Chippendale (British, 1718–1779); T. Becket & P. A. de Hondt (British).

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

Through his designs for furniture and architectural elements, Thomas Chippendale became one of the most influential tastemakers of the 1700s. He published three editions of The Gentleman and Cabinet-Maker’s Director (1754, 1755, and 1762), which sold widely in Britain, Ireland, and America. This rare French version of the third edition demonstrates his effort to spread his designs for both naturalistic and neoclassical decoration even wider across Europe.

Object facts

• Title: The Gentleman and Cabinet-Maker's Director
• Date: 1762
• Creator attribution: Thomas Chippendale (British, 1718–1779); T. Becket & P. A. de Hondt (British)
• Culture: Britain
• Type: Bound Volume
• Technique: Paper, leather
• Dimensions: 47.9 x 30.5 x 6 cm (18 7/8 x 12 x 2 3/8 in.)
• Collection: Decorative Arts
• Department: Decorative Art and Design
• Accession number: 2019.80

A detail from the museum

Fewer than fifteen copies, including this one, of the French edition of Thomas Chippendale’s famous book of designs, are known to exist.

Collection credit

Gift of Philip A. Uhde in memory of his father, Frederick C. Uhde

Further reading listed by the museum

• Gilbert, Christopher. The Life and Work of Thomas Chippendale. London: Studio Vista, 1978.
• Femke Speelberg. “Thomas Chippendale’s Gentleman and Cabinet-maker’s Director” Metropolitan Museum of Art, Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History, (May 2018).

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.