I’m not exactly sure the function of this piece – I suspect it is a sort of room divider or jardiniere made out of wood with burled wood finishes in an Art Deco style, probably from the late 30s to early 40s.

How this gorgeous piece got to me is a complicated tale of Dominicans, dictators, and me.

The Reader’s Digest version follows.

The piece originally belonged to the beauty queen mistress of a Dominican dictator (let’s call him RT), who was in power from 1930 until his assassination (allegedly by the CIA ) in 1961 (the year I was born…coincidence?) Being already married and like all good Latin machistas not inclined to divorce, RT did the next best thing by providing financial support and publicly recognizing their out-of-wedlock children – one boy and one girl.

The unofficial household were comfortably and conveniently established in a Miami Beach estate located on Collins Avenue and later sold and torn down to make way for a major resort hotel (the Conover?)

Moving right along, the daughter married Tio Joe circa 1960, and the whatever-it-is passed on to Mother (AKA Belica, Isabel Suarez nee Cremata) – an inveterate keeper of, well, everything. It was in her home, next door to mine, that I fell in love with “it”. Exiled in a storage room adjacent to the carport of Mother’s house, the two tops on either end became water damaged and the veneer warped.  Nonetheless, it was still a score when Mother passed it on to me.

Your father hated it from the beginning. Besotted and bewitched by its beauty and whiff of notoriety, I ignored his threats to throw it out of the moving van or into the backyard lake. Lucky for all of us, he decided to try his hand at restoring it a few years ago, using the greatest of care I might add.

Today, it is a singularly stunning and celebrated piece admired by all who see it…and its piquant provenance ain’t too shabby either!