Burr elm with kingwood and boxwood details. Made for Mary Eleanor Lyon-Bowes (1749-1800), Countess of Strathmore, grandmother of John Bowes. Mary Eleanor, Countess of Strathmore, was a keen amateur botanist and she commissioned William Paterson, a Scottish botanist, to collect plants for her during four journeys of the Cape of Good Hope between 1777 and 1779. This cabinet contained part of her collection of botanical specimens until at least the 1850s but their whereabouts is not now known. The medallions on the front seem to be portrait busts but it has not been possible to identify the subjects. Purchased with the assistance of the V&A Purchase Grant Fund, The Art Fund and the Friends of the Bowes Museum