You know you’ve made it when you spend lazy weekends soaking in your white Carrara marble bathtub, ideally while feeding grapes into your mouth while being fanned by a large leaf. In all seriousness though, this is certainly a “wow” piece for any home. The lion’s head is clearly the standout detail here, but the carved waves on the side and the way the rim has been carved to look like fish scales makes it the whole package.
Incidentally, Carrara marble is an interesting material – quarried from the town of Carrara in Tuscany, it is the same material used to carve such treasures as the Pantheon, Trajan’s Column, Michelangelo’s David as well as many of his other works, and the Marble Arch in London, directly in front of Buckingham Palace. You can see the famed blue-gray veins in this piece off to the right of the picture.
Available until April 1st as Lot 308 in the Fine European Furniture Including Tapestries, Silver, Ceramics and Carpets Auction at Sotheby’s New York Office.
