Card Table

Trained as a cabinet-maker in Paris, Charles-Honoré Lannuier arrived in New York in 1803 at the age of twenty-four. His older brother was already well established as the owner of a successful confectionary shop on Broadway and from there the young furniture maker first advertised his services to all potential clients who desired furniture in the “latest French fashion.” Early-nineteenth-century America was much enamored with French taste, and Lannuier successfully catered to his upscale clientele, tempering his designs to suit their preference even while he retained a distinctive French flair. One of a group of similar card tables, this example shares many of their decorative and design elements, including a winged caryatid central support, a Lannuier trademark.