Garniture

The Golden Cabinet or Salon Louis XVI received some garniture today. Garniture, as you may know is "a set of decorative accessories, in particular vases" (as defined for us by the Oxford English Dictionary). In fact, four gouaches by landscape painter Van Barenberghe, two pairs of vases and a restored clock are now part of the precious artefacts decorating the cabinet. The two Molitor encoignures are also, at least for now, part of the room's furniture.

Two very rare golden vases from the Shang period of the Hang Dynasty are exhibited on the mantelpiece. In the corners of the room, each encoignure supports a pair of Japanese hexagonal jars from the 17th century in the Emari ware style. The four gouaches, at last, bring a welcome and soothing touch of blue to the decor, counterbalancing the omnipresent gold.

Oh, and did you notice we made the skirting board too?

Overdoor

This overdoor painting by Francesco Guardi (1712-1793) is now decorating the Duchess's bedroom in Her apartments of the South East Pavilion of the Secretaries of State. A similar painting by the same Venetian artist is facing this one, above the opposite door. Work continues on the bedroom decoration. The antechamber, next door, has received a white wood paneling decoration and a new fireplace as well. We may show you a photograph of this last room when its floor is completed.

Fireplace

A newly delivered Louis XV style fireplace made for a room being decorated in the South East Pavilion of the Secretaries of State of the Palace of Versailles.

Quick Update On Golden Cabinet

The parquet has been laid in the Golden Cabinet. We're still waiting for the skirting board though...

Please, see the previous post if you want more details about this room.

Golden Cabinet or Salon Louis XVI

At last! At last the content of this blog is getting closer to the promises of its subtitle. It's been months since we advertised to you the Gilded Rooms of the Palace of Versailles. Rooms you saw plenty (OK : you saw some rooms). But gold? Well... Voilà! The Golden Cabinet (where did they got that name I wonder) has received its gilded panels today, which are our first recent attempt at recreating the white and gold wooden paneling so closely associated with Versailles. The fireplace is new and voluntarily quite sober to let the gilded boiseries (wooden paneling) and the Versailles style floor speak for themselves. Oh, sure, for now, you'll have to imagine the floor... (But have a look at some other posts on this blog, such at this one, to have a taste of things to come.) For the moment, we borrowed an encoignure to the Prints Cabinet next door, we chose to display in this room the desserte acquired in July, and we present a portrait of Louis XVI on the back wall to pay homage to the last king to have inhabited the palace.

From the drawing to the actual woodwork. 

In the Cabinet, if the panels of boiserie are prudently crafted in a relatively sober Louis XVI style, all in straight lines, to let us challenge increasingly the difficulty of making carved gilded ornaments, the mirror frames, on the other hand, are boldly displaying the curves and intricacy of the previous Louis XV style. Such a combination of styles is of course not uncommon, as each style was not strictly framed in time, but rather melted progressively into the next.

Mirror effects at night in the Salon Louis XVI