PROBABLY BY MELLIER & CO., LATE 19TH CENTURY

Operating from premises located at 60 Margaret Street and Cavendish Square, London, the Anglo-French firm of Mellier & Co. is recorded as having taken over the family business of Monbro when the latter ceased trading in the 1880s (see C. Payne, 19th Century European Furniture, Woodbridge, 1981, p. 40). They were amongst the English manufacturers who exhibited at the 1904 St Louis World's Fair. A related bureau plat by Mellier & Co. was sold Christie's South Kensington, 7 February 2012, lot 168. William Bertram & Son established their Soho based business in 1830 however the present piece is more typical of the oeuvre of Mellier, so was more likely produced by the latter who had a particular reputation for this furniture of this type and superb quality. In either case the presence of the two marks would indicate that the piece was produced by one firm and subsequently retailed by the other.