Peter Drinkwater is unknown. Bolton has suggested that he may have been a member of the Drinkwater family of Kirby Park on the Isle of Man, but there was no child named Peter born to that family during the eighteenth century. Alternatively, this may have been Peter Drinkwater (1750-1801), a successful manufacturer of fustian and cotton, and a merchant based in Bolton, Manchester and Cheshire.

In 1779 Drinkwater commissioned the Adam office to make this design for a chimneypiece and overmantel mirror frame, but the intended location and executed status of the design are not known.

Literature:
A.T. Bolton, The architecture of Robert and James Adam, 1922, Volume II, Index pp. 53, 69; E. Harris, The furniture of Robert Adam, 1963, p. 59; ‘Drinkwater, Peter (1750-1801)’, Oxford dictionary of national biography online

Frances Sands, 2015