Chippendale furnished the best bedrooms, also known as lodging rooms, on the second floor at Harewood and the bed displayed here is only one of three to have survived. The drapery and furnishings are not original to the bed, but from the Day Work Book we do know that damask, Manchester stripe, green china, purple and white, stripe cotton, bamboo cotton and India chintz hangings were all used for these beds.
In comparison to the State Bed, designed to be an extravagant display of wealth, this piece is much more restrained but still very much in the Neo-classical style. Typical features of this style include the anthemion cresting, architectural cornices, swags of husks and tapering fluted columns. The lodging rooms were intended for guests and it was important therefore that they were decorated in the most fashionable taste, but not to the extravagance of the State Bedroom which was intended for only the most important guests.
The design of the bed would have fitted in with the overall decorative scheme of the room, with the drapery of the bed echoing the wall hangings and the design of the bed cornices repeated in the window cornices. Chairs and tables intended for the same room would have been painted again to compliment the overall scheme. All the various elements of the room were designed to create a unified scheme incorporating all the various elements of the room. Such a scheme survives to some extent on the second floor, in the Chintz Bedroom.
Bedstead
c.1770-72
The Earl & Countess of Harewood, & the Trustees of the Harewood House Trust
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