When a writing flap was added to the table Cabinet it became a portable writing desk, Escritorio in Spanish, Scrittorio in Italian. Of larger dimensions and made to preserve documents and valuables, then displayed on a trestle stand, it was the Vargueño in Spain and Portugal, in Germany the Schreibtisch. In Italy from the Renaissance onwards the Cabinet or Stipo is intimately linked with the birth of the Studiolo, the Prince’s small private room within his palace. The first and perhaps the most famous Studiolo belonged to Federico da Montefeltro, the Italian condottiero, a mercenary captain, humanist and patron of the arts, who became the Duke of Urbino. At the height of his power, he created in the renovated Ducal Palace a court of artists on a par with Lorenzo de’ Medici’s court in Florence. Inside his palace he conceived a small intimate place at first totally private. There the humanist scholar could meditate, read, study and pray in his Studiolo. Its walls were covered with inlaid wood panels and decorated by the most famous artists of the time. Others followed his example: in Ferrara Lionello d’Este’s Studiolo di Belfiore and of Alfonso I d’Este’s Camerini d’Alabastro; in Mantua Isabella d’Este’s Camerino of Enea, and Vespasiano Gonzaga Colonna; in Florence Cosimo I, Francesco I and Cosimo II de’ Medici’s Studioli. These rooms dedicated to intellectual and spiritual pursuit very soon were filled with wondrous works of art and rare objects. They became in their own right a separate place, a microcosm reflecting and reproducing the complexity of the world around.

The Cabinets were the ultimate expression of the art of furniture making and of the high standard of the woodworkers’ craftsmanship. Very often as part of a constant search for a rich and sophisticated effect, various essences of wood and precious material were used in some unusual ways, for example in the shape of a small Greek temple. The materials used as veneers were of the most diverse and rich kind: ebony, pietre dure, ivory, refined lacquers in Chinoiserie style. The Cabinets were further embellished with small cherubs, carved or engraved corals, gilt bronze, brass or silver mounts, or glass panels with oil paintings as in the Neapolitan fashion. The decorative patterns and elements adorning the Cabinets were drawn from nature, birds and flowers, from classical mythological or allegorical themes, more rarely from the Bible. The seventeenth century’s love and quest for fine materials always rarer and more precious, encouraged the use of tortoiseshell, now available from the new American colonies of Habsburgs’ Spain. Backed with coloured pigments, it glowed with great splendour on the dark ground veneered in ebony. Under the influence of the Baroque taste for splendour and grandeur, the Cabinets assumed a monumental and impressive scale. They were built like small palaces with an increased number of compartments and porticos surrounded by small columns and concealing a series of secret drawers and compartments. Conversely Cabinets of various sizes were produced on a smaller scale for a more functional use to be placed on a desk or a table. In the eighteenth century Cabinets assumed more restrained proportions and were placed on slender stands. Cabinets were greatly valued by collectors, among them in France by Cardinal Mazarin and King Louis XIV who had in their possessions several Stipi all’italiana, Cabinets in the Italian style. In modern times the production of Cabinets has decreased although the connoisseurs’ passion for these exceptional pieces of furniture has never abated. In fact the most expensive piece of furniture in history is the Badminton Cabinet, produced for the Duke of Somerset between 1726 and 1732, and sold at auction in 2004 for more than 27 millions of euros to Prince Hans-Adam II of Liechteinstein for his Vienna Museum.