Early 20th Century Painted Butterfly Sideboard

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Description

Scrolling openwork brackets — carved in a form collectors call "butterfly" spandrels — fill the corners where the top meets … Read more Scrolling openwork brackets — carved in a form collectors call "butterfly" spandrels — fill the corners where the top meets the case on this sideboard, a decorative flourish distinct to certain regional Chinese cabinetmaking traditions and one of the more labor-intensive details a piece like this can carry. Three drawers span the top, each shaped panel front centered with a cloud-form brass pull, sitting above a pair of doors flanked by two narrower cabinets, each with its own small drawer and ring pull. The case is finished in a deep red lacquer that has worn unevenly over what appears to be decades of use — heaviest at the top surface and drawer fronts, with darker, better-preserved lacquer visible at the case sides and lower panels. This is not a piece DE-COR has touched up; the wear pattern itself is part of what dates it. Behind the center doors, a single interior shelf runs the width of the cabinet, offering a deep storage bay flanked by the two side cabinets' shelving.

At 64" wide and a modest 35" tall, this reads as a dining room sideboard or a substantial entry console — long enough to anchor a wall, low enough to layer objects on top without competing with artwork above it.

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