The historic Stansted Park suite of giltwood seat furniture was almost certainly commissioned by the 2nd Earl of Halifax for his stately mansion at Stansted Park in Sussex in the 1760s. It remained there until a fire consumed the building in 1900. It was sold at Christie’s in 1911 when it entered a glamorous new chapter among America’s collecting elite.
Eleven chairs and two settees were acquired by Duveen’s great client, the financier Edward Stotesbury, a partner to J.P. Morgan and one of Philadelphia’s most prominent patrons. He was worth over $100 million at the height of his career. The suite was placed in his palatial mansion Whitemarsh Hall, a monument to American wealth and society in the early 20th century. Known as ‘the Versailles of America’, Whitemarsh was built by the most outstanding artisans of the day: Horace Trumbauer was the architect, while Duveen orchestrated the interiors together with the Royal decorator Sir Charles Allom and the Parisian firm of Alavoine.
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