Masonic Master's Chair
Benjamin Bucktrout
Williamsburg, Virginia, 1766-1777
Mahogany with black walnut
Catalog no. 54

In addition to being one of America's few surviving examples of pre-Revolutionary Masonic seating furniture, this Master's chair is also the only known piece of signed Williamsburg furniture. Built by cabinetmaker Benjamin Bucktrout, himself a Freemason, the chair has survived in unusually good condition and retains its original leather upholstery.

The chair exhibits a combination of rocaille ornament and Masonic imagery that sharply diverges from conventional eighteenth-century designs for ceremonial seating. To the informed Mason, however, the elaborately orchestrated chair back visually embodies the fundamental tenets of the organization. Each of the tools and architectural elements carries a particular meaning and therefore is less an ornament than a missive to be read by those in the organization.