Designed to sit below the large pier glasses that had been made in Paris, these pier tables were made to fit the exact dimensions of the spaces between the windows of the east front of the Drawing Room. Of semi-elliptical form, the shallow radius tops are beautifully veneered in several woods including West Indian satinwood, mahogany, and purpleheart derived from tropical rainforests which were being cleared by enslaved people for plantations.

Purpleheart was grown on the north coast of South America and in the Spanish colony of Trinidad. It was traded to Britain through the freeport of Grenada from 1787, so would have been an appropriate choice of timber for Ninian Home. His letter books of May 1787 to October 1792 show that only ‘2 stools for the piers in the East front’ of the Drawing Room were required in 1789 (15^th January), indicating that he must have been persuaded at a slightly later date to upgrade to more expensive pier tables and glasses. No bills survive for these items. (See letter of 4^th September 1790).

These tables were conserved in the autumn of 2022 with funding from Museums Galleries Scotland. Multiple loose veneers were carefully reattached and poor old repairs were treated and made good.

The design of these tables includes intricate crossbanding and stringing in holly and ebony and tulipwood fore-edges, enhanced by engraved designs in holly and penwork. The vegetable dyes have faded over time, but evidence of red for berries, and green for leaves survives. The husk chains divide the top into nine segments united by drapery festoons executed in penwork. The table frieze of mahogany is crossbanded in holly and inset with four oval fan paterae, raised on four turned and reeded legs of solid mahogany with collared capitals and ‘carrot’ feet.