Antique Boulle Red Tortoiseshell Bonheur Du Jour circa 1870

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Antique Boulle Red Tortoiseshell Bonheur Du Jour circa 1870

About the Item

This is a gorgeous antique French Red Tortoiseshell and cut brass inlaid ebonised Boulle, Bureau de Dame or Bonheur du Jour, circa 1870 in date. The cavetto top is surmounted with a brass three quarter gallery and has two cupboard doors with beautiful raised oval panels , enclosing shelves, with two half width drawers below. The base is of serpentine shaped form with a full width frieze drawer and it stands on slender cabriole legs with ormolu caryatid mounts and sabots. The desk is decorated with beautiful ormolu mounts throughout. Complete with original keys and working locks. This is an example of superb quality and design and will get noticed wherever it is placed. Condition: In excellent condition having been beautifully restored in our workshops, please see photos for confirmation. Dimensions in cm: Height 100 x Width 71 x Depth 42 Dimensions in inches: Height 3 feet, 3 inches x Width 2 feet, 4 inches x Depth 1 foot, 4 inches A bonheur du jour (in French, bonheur-du-jour, meaning "daytime delight") is a type of lady's writing desk. It was introduced in Paris by one of the interior decorators and purveyors of fashionable novelties called marchands-merciers about 1760, and speedily became intensely fashionable. The bonheur du jour is always very light and graceful, with a decorated back, since it often did not stand against the wall but was moved about the room. Its special characteristic is a raised back, which may form a little cabinet or a nest of drawers, or open shelves, which might be closed with atambour may simply be fitted with a mirror. The top, often surrounded with a chased and gilded bronze gallery, serves for placing small ornaments. Beneath the writing surface there is usually a single drawer, often neatly fitted for toiletries or writing supplies. Early examples were raised on slender cabriole legs; under the influence of neoclassicism, examples made after about 1775 had straight, tapering legs. The marchand-mercier Simon-Philippe Poirierhad had the idea of mounting bonheurs du jour with specially-made plaques of Sèvres porcelainthat that he commissioned and for which he had a monopoly; the earliest Sèvres-mounted bonheur du jours are datable from the marks under their plaques to 1766-67. The choicer examples of the time are inlaid with marquetry or panels of Oriental lacquer, banded with exotic woods, with gilt-bronze mounts. By the mid-1770s the bonheur du jour was being made in London, where it was simply called a "lady's writing-desk". André-Charles Boulle (1642 – 1732) was the French cabinetmaker who is generally considered to be the preeminent artist in the field of marquetry. His fame in marquetry led to his name being given to a fashion of inlaying known as Boulle (or in 19th-century Britain, Buhl work). Boulle appears to have been originally a painter, since the first payment to him by the crown of which there is any record (1669) specifies ouvrages de peinture. He was employed for many years at Versailles, where the mirrored walls, the floors of wood mosaic, the inlaid panelling and the marquetry furniture in the Cabinet du Dauphin were regarded as his most remarkable work. These rooms were long since dismantled and their contents dispersed, but Boulle's drawings for the work are in the Musée des Arts Décoratifs, Paris. His royal commissions were numerous, as we learn both from the Comptes des B timents du Roi and from the correspondence of Louvois. Not only the most magnificent of French monarchs, but foreign princes and the great nobles and financiers of his own country crowded to him with commissions, and the mot of the abbé de Marolles, Boulle y lourne en ovale, has become a stock quotation in the literature of French cabinetmaking. Our reference: 06012w

Dimensions:
Height: 39.38 in (100 cm)Width: 27.96 in (71 cm)Depth: 16.54 in (42 cm)
Place of Origin:
France
Period:
Late 19th Century
Date of Manufacture:
circa 1870
Condition:
Seller Location:
London, GB
Reference Number:
1stDibs: LU95062577532