Fine Greek Revival Bronze Vase after a Design by Thomas Hope
£1,900
A fine Greek revival bronze vase or urn after a design by Thomas Hope, of baluster shape and with volute and swans’ head handles, raised on a stepped marble base
Based on fig. 1 in plate 40 of Thomas Hope’s Household Furniture and Interior Decoration published in 1807
Thomas Hope’s designs were all taken from objects and furniture he actually owned either at his London house in Duchess Street or his Surrey villa, The Deepdene. It is possible that the present vase is Thomas Hope’s original, though it is now impossible to tell as he used no inventory marks and once his designs were published they were, of course, open to be copied by other craftsmen. Thomas Hope’s bronze-worker of choice was the immigrant French craftsman, Alexis Decaix, who was already working in England by 1789. Hope claimed the shape of this vase and the design of the handles were inspired by a Greek original he saw at Portici, but both seem to come directly from the famous marble vase of circa 50BC by Sosibios, now in the Louvre and once the property of Louis XIV
