Secrétaire à abattant

Duncan Phyfe

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The rippling figure of mahogany veneers sheaths the Classically inspired columnar supports and architectonic mass of this secrétaire à abattant, or "French secretary" according to the 1834 New York cabinetmakers’ price book. In the 1830s and 40s, the Phyfe workshop embraced the revival of Grecian designs and use of flashy veneering techniques popularized by their French counterparts. The Phyfe workshop produced very few secrétaires but may have based this form on number 368 of volume one (1813-1815) in Pierre de La Mésangère’s Collection de Meubles et Objets de Goût (1820–1831). The secrétaire employs sophisticated hardware such as spring-locked drawers for the safekeeping of valuables and a drop-fron with a weighted iron balance hinge.

The American Wing

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The American Wing's ever-evolving collection comprises some 20,000 works of art by African American, Euro American, Latin American, and Native American men and women. Ranging from the colonial to early-modern periods, the holdings include painting, sculpture, works on paper, and decorative arts—including furniture, textiles, ceramics, glass, silver, metalwork, jewelry, basketry, quill and bead embroidery—as well as historical interiors and architectural fragments.

Metropolitan Museum of Art