CHIPPENDALE Thomas 1718-1779
English cabinet maker and decorative designer born in Yorkshire. His designs were so widely followed that much 18th-cent. English furniture is grouped under his name, but only those pieces for which the original bills survive (e.g., for Harewood House) can be assigned unquestionably to his workshop. To the sober design and fine construction of the Queen Anne and Georgian styles he added Chinese, Gothic, and Rococo motifs.
He made chairs of many types, from geometrical to sumptuously carved; desks; mirror frames; china cabinets and bookcases; and tables with fretted galleries and cluster-column Gothic legs.
A large collection of Chippendale furniture together with a giant chair copy can be found at Paxton House, Berwickshire, Scotland.
He is well known to have collaborated with Robert Adam.