Dressing tables were usually placed between windows with a looking glass above so that the user could work with natural light on his face. Throughout the 18th century, the tops of dressing tables were protected from cosmetics with a cloth. Inventories made references to a "dressing table and cover" or "Chamber table & cloth."

Philadelphia dressing tables in the Queen Anne style had arched skirts with shallow drawers in the lower register but, after about 1750, the skirt was lowered to accommodate an enlarged center lower drawer that was ornamented with carving. The exuberant, large-scale carving applied to the skirt of this dressing table is exceptional as such carving is usually in lower relief and more subordinate to the drawer carving. This example is one of a distinct type of dressing table, although not all tables of this type appear to be made by the same craftsmen. The greatest similarity is between the concave shells carved on the drawer fronts, each of which has five large tapered flutes that are stop-fluted, the identical scalloped edge with circles incised above the flutes, and a projecting flower above the brass pull flanked by horizontal leaves. These tables also have applied leaves on the drawer that terminate in circular scrolls. Similar scrolled leaves flank the shells on the high chest signed by Henry Cliffton and Thomas Carteret and dated November 15, 1753, which suggests that the Department of State's dressing table may be another early essay in the Chippendale style.

This dressing table may be the mate to a high chest also in the Department of State, although this relationship cannot be proven because of alterations made to both pieces. The original leaf applique's on the dressing table's drawer were replaced to match replacements on the high chest base. The design and construction of the base and dressing table indicate that they were produced in the same workshop. The shells were carved from the same pattern, although they were executed by different craftsmen. A virtually identical base from another high chest made in the same shop is known, with applied carving identical to the dressing table's before it was altered.