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Lot Essay
An Eye to the West
Although the main patrons of Art Deco were based in France, one of the period’s most ambitious and complete residential interiors was created in the United States: the San Francisco penthouse of Charles Templeton Crocker, the millionaire grandson of the founder of the Union Pacific Railroad. Crocker had bought the Russian Hill property in 1927 and traveled to Paris where he met decorator Jean-Michel Frank whom he commissioned to decorate the apartment.
At a time when the city remained steeped in Victoriana, the apartment made a radical statement. Vogue declared it in 1929 “the first large and luxurious apartment done completely in the modern manner in the United States,” and “perhaps one of the most beautiful apartments in the world.” The living room featured parchment-clad walls and ceilings, mica-inlaid fireplace surrounds, ivory Morocco leather seating, and tables in shagreen, straw, and parchment, softly illuminated by rose quartz and obsidian lamps.
The penthouse was also a collaborative masterpiece with the dining room, breakfast room, and master bedroom designed by Jean Dunand, whose work contrasted boldly with Frank’s restraint. Trained as a sculptor and master of dinanderie and lacquer, Dunand was celebrated for his dramatic use of color and for his signature eggshell lacquer inlaid with coquille d’œuf (eggshell). At Crocker’s, Jean Dunand created a vibrant dining room with red-brown lacquer furniture inlaid with crushed eggshell and walls of sweeping gold and silver rays. The adjacent breakfast room, conceived as an underwater fantasy, featured etched tropical fish on black onyx lacquer, pink and silver furnishings, and chrome-tubed chairs. The bedroom combined black and grey lacquer furniture with silver-toned woodland scenes in laque arraché, including inlaid animal figures.
The present pair of games tables were originally placed in the bedroom, their “sponged” surface exemplifying Dunand’s preferred lacque arraché technique, in which a final lacquer layer is applied over a roughened undercoat: here, metallic gray over black, and then polished so that the raised points of the lower layer emerge, producing a smooth yet subtly mottled effect. The ensemble was dismantled and dispersed in 1959.
Although the main patrons of Art Deco were based in France, one of the period’s most ambitious and complete residential interiors was created in the United States: the San Francisco penthouse of Charles Templeton Crocker, the millionaire grandson of the founder of the Union Pacific Railroad. Crocker had bought the Russian Hill property in 1927 and traveled to Paris where he met decorator Jean-Michel Frank whom he commissioned to decorate the apartment.
At a time when the city remained steeped in Victoriana, the apartment made a radical statement. Vogue declared it in 1929 “the first large and luxurious apartment done completely in the modern manner in the United States,” and “perhaps one of the most beautiful apartments in the world.” The living room featured parchment-clad walls and ceilings, mica-inlaid fireplace surrounds, ivory Morocco leather seating, and tables in shagreen, straw, and parchment, softly illuminated by rose quartz and obsidian lamps.
The penthouse was also a collaborative masterpiece with the dining room, breakfast room, and master bedroom designed by Jean Dunand, whose work contrasted boldly with Frank’s restraint. Trained as a sculptor and master of dinanderie and lacquer, Dunand was celebrated for his dramatic use of color and for his signature eggshell lacquer inlaid with coquille d’œuf (eggshell). At Crocker’s, Jean Dunand created a vibrant dining room with red-brown lacquer furniture inlaid with crushed eggshell and walls of sweeping gold and silver rays. The adjacent breakfast room, conceived as an underwater fantasy, featured etched tropical fish on black onyx lacquer, pink and silver furnishings, and chrome-tubed chairs. The bedroom combined black and grey lacquer furniture with silver-toned woodland scenes in laque arraché, including inlaid animal figures.
The present pair of games tables were originally placed in the bedroom, their “sponged” surface exemplifying Dunand’s preferred lacque arraché technique, in which a final lacquer layer is applied over a roughened undercoat: here, metallic gray over black, and then polished so that the raised points of the lower layer emerge, producing a smooth yet subtly mottled effect. The ensemble was dismantled and dispersed in 1959.