Lot Essay
This suite of seat-furniture à la Cathédrale, with its reeded columnar legs, palm-bud enrichments and orb-ended arms, relates to the French 'Moyen Age' style promoted by the architect Krafft in his Plans...des plus belles maisons...construits à Paris of 1801. This volume included engravings of the celebrated l'hôtel Osmond, decorated au goût troubadour with Egyptian and arabesque rooms and a cabinet gothique. The latter, recorded in a watercolour of 1820 by Garneray, was furnished with a related suite of Gothic seat-furniture stamped by Jacob D.R. Meslée, which is now in the Musée du Petit Palais. Although this brand is traditionally identified with Jacob's oeuvre between 1803-13, they must in fact have been supplied shortly after the Osmond's marriage in 1817 (A. Pradère, 'Du Style Troubadour au Style Boulle', Connaissance des Arts, 1993, pp.72-80).
A related chair with palm-bud enriched styles is illustrated in M. Jarry, Le Siège Français, Fribourg, 1973, fig. 329, p.329.
A related chair with palm-bud enriched styles is illustrated in M. Jarry, Le Siège Français, Fribourg, 1973, fig. 329, p.329.