2.7 Appropriation as a Form of Nationalism? Collecting French Furniture in the Nineteenth Century – Adriana Turpin

The Market for French Eighteenth-Century Furniture

The taste in Britain for eighteenth-century French furniture from the Ancien Régime that developed during the nineteenth century followed many years of English aristocrats visiting Paris and purchasing luxury goods in the capital. Throughout the eighteenth century Paris had been the centre of civilised life for the British aristocracy. As many as 200 English visitors to Paris are recorded between 1739 and 1783.¹¹ As the first stop of the Grand Tour, Paris was where young British aristocrats learned manners, how to converse and how to dress, and it was to Paris that British aristocrats, such as Horace Walpole, Lord Coventry in the 1760s or the young 2nd Lord Spencer or the Duke of Bedford in the 1780s, went to purchase furniture, porcelains, gilt bronzes and mirror glass.¹² George IV, one of the most prolific purchasers of eighteenth-century French decorative arts, had been acquiring items and furnishing Carlton House as Prince of Wales in the latest Parisian taste before the Revolution. At Carlton House his patronage of the Francophile architect Henry Holland was extended to the French painter and decorator Jean-Jacques Boulieu (1787–1800) and to Dominique Daguerre (1772–96), one of the most important Parisian marchand-merciers who had migrated to London before the Revolution. Moreover, he bought, through Daguerre, furniture from contemporary Parisian cabinetmakers and also some earlier pieces.¹³ Most of the aristocratic purchases in Paris were of contemporary furniture, gilt bronzes and Sèvres porcelain; however, there is evidence that some collectors were buying Boulle furniture earlier in the eighteenth century.¹⁴ William Beckford, living in Paris, may have acquired his appreciation for the works of André Charles Boulle (1642–1732) from the extensive collections of rich French eighteenth-century financiers, such as Randon de Boisset (1708–76) or Augustin de Blondel de Gagny (1695–1776). The importance of Boulle furniture that dominated nineteenth-century collecting in Britain was thus predominantly a direct transfer of taste from the Parisian collector.¹⁵ Boulle furniture was one of the most highly desirable to collect, and thus this early appreciation of this work is one of the first examples of buying “antique” furniture made for a previous generation at a time when almost all furnishings would have been contemporary. The French Revolution and the number of works of art from royal and aristocratic collections to appear on the market have always been seen as key factors in the transformation of the market, not only in Britain, but perhaps more spectacularly there. It is worth mentioning that works of art from earlier periods were just beginning to appear in auction catalogues and references to certain types of historical pieces, such as Italian cabinets with panels of pietre dure, can be found listed in English sale catalogues from about 1800.¹⁶ Collecting French furniture from the eighteenth century was thus one of the several historicist movements that drew on the past to provide inspiration for the contemporary,¹⁷ but one with particular resonance and on a far larger scale, as the thousands of goods available created the perfect scenario for the English market, in which a burgeoning demand was fed and then multiplied by a plentiful supply.

Amongst the first to appreciate the possibilities of the market were the dealers. While it is very difficult to ascertain the exact mechanisms by which works of art were bought and sold, it seems that at the sales of royal furniture in Paris held by the revolutionary government in the 1790s the names of the buyers were all French.¹⁸ Many of them were dealers, but Jean-Henri Riesener (1734–1806), former cabinetmaker to Marie Antoinette, was also a buyer, acquiring at low prices the furniture he had supplied to the crown.¹⁹ How sales were then made to the English collectors, who had the money to buy, is not clear, but certainly English visitors flocked to Paris during the peace of Amiens between 1802 and 1803. George IV certainly acquired a pair of cabinets at that time from Daguerre’s partner, Martin-Eloy Lignereux (1751–1809) with plaques of pietre dure.²⁰ According to the royal accounts, many of George IV’s acquisitions were actually made after 1815 and the opening up of the Paris market after the blockades of the Napoleonic Wars.²¹ However, it has always been suggested that some goods were allowed to leave France via Holland or Germany, so it is always possible that French furniture was available to collectors before 1815.²² Judging from the fact that so many works of art appeared in Britain after the defeat of Napoleon, it seems probable that they were bought during the revolutionary period by French dealers. A number of these had been successful auctioneers and dealers before the Revolution and were able to continue dealing in France under Napoleon. Alexander Pradère has shown how Lebrun, auctioneer of paintings before 1793, adviser to the French revolutionary government before 1803 and then dealer under Napoleon, both collected and sold Boulle furniture, some even to Napoleon.²³ The leading Parisian dealers, amongst whom Philippe-Claude Maëlrondt (1766–1824) was perhaps the most famous, sold French Ancien Régime furniture to the English and, once established, the collecting of French works of art only intensified in the years after the end of the Napoleonic Wars.²⁴ Not only did Maëlrondt gather works of art in Paris that would appeal to the English taste, he worked with cabinetmakers such as the Bellangé family to supply old and new furniture to an extensive list of clients, most notably George IV and often through English intermediaries.²⁵

Although French dealers may have dominated the supply to England in the early years of the nineteenth century, soon afterwards, English dealers began to buy directly in Paris and import French works of art into the country. By 1845 when the auction house of Foster and Son put up for sale ‘FOREIGN ANCIENT ELEGANCIES including beautiful marqueterie commodes, consoles and tables,’ the catalogue went on to say ‘which by direction of the IMPORTER will be sold by auction.’ Sir Geoffrey de Bellaigue has traced the career of one of the most significant of these dealers and importers, Edward Holmes Baldock, itemising his sales of Sèvres porcelain and eighteenth-century French furniture to such distinguished collectors as the Duke of Buccleuch and Queensberry, where surviving bills show the extent of the purchases and the sums paid to Baldock (Fig. 7.1).²⁶ It seems that Baldock bought his works of art in Paris, although his name also appears on English auction catalogues. Baldock, of course, not only bought pieces of Sèvres or important examples of French furniture which he brought into England; he also bought parts of old furniture and remade them into new pieces or had the Sèvres porcelain mounted or re-mounted for the English market. His sale catalogue of 1843, for example, has several lots of ebony panels, which he no doubt used to create cabinets or cupboards in the style of the French seventeenth century.²⁷

The market for furniture from the Ancien Régime was thus created primarily in England firstly by French and then English dealers. In France, at least in the first part of the century, modern furnishings seem to have been more appreciated than antiques. For example, the price of 450 francs realised for a Boulle cabinet by the dealer Rocheux to the garde-meuble for Fontainebleau in 1807 is remarkably low in comparison to 3,000 francs for a new mahogany secretaire.²⁸ In England, however, as evidenced through the sales taking place throughout the century, there was a strong and continuous market for antique French furniture, which were highlighted by the dealers and auctioneers, even though of course modern copies and pastiches were also sold throughout the century. The first sale catalogues selected two main criteria to highlight the importance of their sales: royal provenance and the historic names of André Charles Boulle and Riesener. The first sale catalogues emphasised that the works of art came directly from Paris; that they were often described as royal added to their authority. This was clearly stated on the front pages of the catalogues. An 1816 Phillips sale catalogue, for example, was presented as a Catalogue of Parisian furniture including 4 armoires, 3 splendid commodes, cabinets etc […] from the Palaces of Versailles and Compiegne and the Chateau of Malmaison or in 1818, a Catalogue of one of the most splendid and extensive selection of Parisian Furniture, Bronzes etc that has ever been imported […]²⁹

Moreover, the catalogue entries and the prices fetched clearly highlight the importance of furniture by André Charles Boulle and Jean-Henri Riesener. The name of Boulle is not surprising in that French collectors throughout the eighteenth century had paid great sums for his work. That of Riesener was a new phenomenon, possibly a direct result of its availability on the market and the dealers’ promotion of him as the ‘royal cabinetmaker’ to Louis XVI and his queen. At the sale of Wanstead House in 1823, a Parisian Boulle cabinet in brass and tortoiseshell described as antique reached £31 10s and a superb Parisian Boulle commode in the Grand Salon went for 40 guineas or £44 6s, both amongst the highest prices paid for individual pieces.³⁰ A few years later at the sale held by ‘A Gentleman from the West Country,’ thought to include furniture owned by William Beckford, a Boulle writing table was sold for a similar amount, £25 4s; however a red Boulle armoire said to have been made for Louis XV’s cabinet at Versailles fetched much more at £236 5s, which reflects the emphasis placed on authenticity and provenance.³¹ Similar huge prices were reached for exceptional pieces of Boulle in the two important sales by George Watson-Taylor.³² Furniture by Riesener could reach equal heights. Thus in the same sale of 1825, the Marquess of Hertford paid £179 11s for a Riesener roll-top desk, described as coming from the French royal garde-meuble.³³ The sale contained a lacquer commode, which fetched a not dissimilar price of £107 12s without the Riesener name, perhaps because of the fine lacquer.³⁴ George IV most famously paid the highest price reached at the time for a piece of French furniture, £420, with the purchase of the cabinet made for the Comtesse de Provence at the 1825 sale of George Watson Taylor’s collection (Fig. 7.2). The description below of one of the most important and most expensive pieces of French furniture brings together the various selling points emphasised to attract the wealthy buyer:

A MAGNIFICENT CABINET of mahogany elegantly disposed in three panels or compartments, opens by folding doors, surmounted by a mask of Apollo, and a frieze of foliage. In the centre panel is suspended the lyre of Apollo between two wreaths of olive, resting upon a torch which springs from the centre of two branches with Arabesque scrolls connected by festoons […] The arms of a branch of the royal family of France and a group of Cupids of or-molu surmount this splendid piece of furniture (a chef d’œuvre of the ingenious Riesner) […] and formerly belonged to the Palace of Versailles where it was sold by the commissioners of the French Convention in an early period of the Republic.³⁵

Even taking into account the hyperbole of the auction houses, the language of the sale catalogues emphasised the status of French furniture as a collectable commodity and it is clear that what was being sold was status. ‘A matchless Louis XIV Boule table,’ ‘a superb Parisian commode,’ ‘a noble and lofty armoire:’ these were the terms in which this furniture was described.

Thus by the 1830s the prices and reputation of French eighteenth-century furniture was well established and the names of Boulle and Riesener recognised both for the quality of the work and the reputation of the cabinetmakers. In sales later in the century, French furniture continued to command enormous prices, amongst them the sales of the entire contents of Stowe in 1848 and the Hamilton Palace sale in 1882. They are reflections of the extensive amassing of great collections of French furniture, many of which still survive today in the Wallace Collection, at Waddesdon Manor (Rothschild) or Dalmeny (the Earl of Rosebery), to name only some of the most extensive. The acquisitions by the wealthiest collectors in Britain provide a testament to the enormous importance of owning French works of art during the century, which only diminished when wealthier collectors, most notably from the United States, could afford to pay sums of money that their European counterparts found hard to match.³⁶ As has often been pointed out, the furniture at the Hamilton Palace sale in 1882 eclipsed the prices paid for paintings or any other type of artwork. The names of Boulle and Riesener still carried enormous weight; some of the documented pieces by Riesener fetched nearly ten times that of an unsigned piece.³⁷ The Boulle cabinets inherited from Beckford and bought at £400 were sold for £12,075; a Riesener commode fetched £4,305, while the lacquer-veneered secretaire and commode supplied to Marie Antoinette by Riesener were sold for a total of £19,000.³⁸

The collecting of French furnishing was not, however, just confined to the aristocracy or the opulent millionaires, who, as will be seen, decorated their London houses with choice specimens of French furniture. There was a steady and increasing market for French furniture at every level. The Foster auction catalogues held at the Victoria and Albert Museum show that in the biweekly sales held in their auction rooms in Greek Street, Soho, furniture in the “old French” style abounded. As with the more important sales, furniture by Boulle and Riesener was marked out for mention. Generally called ‘Buhl,’ it was often not specified whether the object was authentic or an imitation of French work; the prices could be as low as 11s or as high as several pounds. Those items described as Louis XIV, such as, for example, ‘A Louis XIV Marqueterie commode of 4 drawers, with swept front, massively mounted, with or-molu handles, corners & feet and Italian marble slab’ was sold for four times that price. Thus the above lot sold at Fosters in 1845 fetched £5 17s.³⁹ This is one indication amongst many that the auctioneers could differentiate between the old and the modern, but both were desirable.

The market for furniture in the French style remained strong throughout the last half of the century and ‘old porcelain’ and ‘old decorative furniture’ is found consistently in the drawing rooms of the London wealthy, sometimes cited as the property of ‘a gentleman’ and occasionally of ‘a lady,’ sometimes the sales of individual collectors.⁴⁰ Drawing on the Christie’s catalogues of this period, it is clear that French furniture was found throughout the house, sometimes on its own but equally it could be combined with furniture from other countries, often Italy. Thus in the sale of Christopher Beckett Denison Esq. at Christie’s in 1885, alongside the large collections of French and German porcelain, Wedgwood, French clocks, English and decorative furniture, there was a section of ‘Old French Decorative Furniture’ with obviously original works. Amongst these was a Louis XVI mahogany cabinet, richly mounted, from the Alexander Barker sale, fetching £135. All of the other commodes, cabinets or desks described as Louis XV or Louis XVI were sold for much less, between £25 and £35 on average, while a modern upright satinwood cabinet sold for £6 10s.⁴¹ Denison clearly had a strong collection of French furniture, with only some modern pieces or from other countries. The sale of an anonymous collector, ‘A Gentleman from the Country,’ which took place in 1875, also shows that prices could be very high for Louis XVI furniture, with some of his furniture reaching £136 10s for a Louis XVI commode of ‘old marquetry’ or £535 10s for two Louis XVI parqueterie cabinets in rosewood.⁴² The most expensive piece, a Louis XVI escritoire in tulipwood, was sold to the dealer in French furniture, Durlacher, for £276.⁴³ With such widespread interest in French furnishing it is not surprising that the market remained so strong. The question thus remains as to why collectors were motivated to spend such sums at the top end of the market as well as why the taste for a French-based decorative style remained so appealing to the British of all types of wealth and backgrounds throughout the nineteenth century.

From Criticism to Appreciation

The admirers of original French works of art might cite the great skill, ingenuity and beauty of the originals to defend furnishing their houses and collecting such pieces. However, this admiration needs to be set in the context of a long tradition of distaste and distinct antipathy from British critics often couched in nationalistic terms: the decadence of French art was contrasted with the pure, simple style associated with England. French art was thus seen as ‘weak, ill-jointed and unmeaning’ as well as representing—at least in the eighteenth century—the worst kind of government. In 1753 Isaac Ware wrote: ‘Let us rouse in every sense the national spirit then; and no more permit them to deprave our taste in this noble science than to introduce among us the miseries of their government or fooleries of their religion.’⁴⁴ It was, of course, the rococo style that drew most criticism, particularly after it had fallen from favour throughout Europe. As a result Joshua Reynolds accused French painters, even Poussin and seemingly Boucher, as corrupting ‘the true taste and leading it astray from the pure, the simple and grand style by a mock majesty and false magnificence.’⁴⁵

Throughout the nineteenth century, the same arguments were presented in the journals. British nationalism often expressed itself as anti-French, and critics explained that British painting exemplified British virtues, such as domesticity, simplicity, love of the countryside and morality, in contrast to the excesses of French art. Robert Buchanan, in his attack on Swinburne’s poetry, placed the source of corruption in France: ‘All that is worst in Mr. Swinburne belongs to Baudelaire. The offensive choice of subject, the obtrusion of unnatural passion, the blasphemy, the wretched animalism, are all taken intact out of Les Fleurs de Mal.’⁴⁶ This is not to say that certain French artists such as Delacroix and Ary Scheffer (who was Dutch by birth) were not admired; however, it has been argued that Scheffer’s popularity in England stemmed from his religious morality and thus, in effect, he retained the high moral values associated with British painters. He was collected both by the liberal political families and Liverpool and Manchester merchants.

Criticisms of the French style in architecture stressed the vulgarity of French interiors, implying again a lack of morality. Thus, when writing about the rebuilding of Buckingham House, Johann David Passavant (1787–1861), visiting London in 1836, commented: ‘everyone will join in regretting that so much money should have been expended in converting a fine old palace into one, which from the insignificance of its proportions and unimposing exterior does little credit to the taste of the English nation.’⁴⁷ The explanation he gave was that the magnificence of the interiors satisfied the demand of the new king for an opulent and rich setting for his palace. Passavant continued his disapproval of the style.

It is owing to this, viz. that whatever is most rich is most desirable, that we find the English in their gilt balustrades, chandeliers, brackets & so closely imitating the taste of Louis XIV, in whose reign this mannered style of ornament was most in vogue; and even furniture of this kind, inlaid with a profusion of tortoiseshell, or brass, and groaning beneath the weight of numberless little knickknacks, no less grotesque than itself, is everywhere to be met with in the houses of the wealthy.⁴⁸

Such criticisms from the early part of the century were repeated even more frequently later in the century. Influential writers, such as Charles Locke Eastlake in his Hints on Household Taste, published in 1869, or Edith Wharton in The Decoration of Houses, published some thirty years later, condemned the excesses of French ornamentation or gilding found in contemporary furniture and decoration.⁴⁹ As stated in his introduction, Eastlake’s purpose was to improve contemporary design by showing how design should follow function. He argued for chaste and sober forms, ‘never running into extravagant contour or unnecessary curves.’⁵⁰ French furniture was the opposite of this notion. Thus, he argued, ‘that school of decorative art, bad and vicious in principle as it was, had a certain air of luxury and grandeur about it which was due to elaboration of detail and richness of material. Its worst characteristic was an extravagance of contour and this is just the only characteristic which the tradition of upholstery has preserved.’⁵¹ Other writers went further in their attack on this foreign style, as in The Lady in 1897, when J.H. Duncan wrote: ‘We have so many beautiful styles of our own that it is sheer perversity that prompts us to adopt styles of foreign importation, for which we have no continuity of tradition.’⁵²

Gradually critics began to find elements of French design they approved of. Marshall’s French Home Life, originally published in Blackwood’s Journal and then republished as a treatise in 1873, presented a synthesis of how French design could be given moral value.⁵³ For Marshall bad design and taste had moral implications, which were linked to society’s political and social policies. In discussing the role of the contemporary French servant, which begins the book, Marshall credits the French Revolution as having levelled classes and raised ‘the moral and political value of each individual affected by it.’⁵⁴ He blames French design for a decline in taste and its replacement by a desire for ostentation, show and also an excessive interest in comfort.⁵⁵ He was, of course, discussing the France of the Second Empire and the problems of revivals rather than the originals from the eighteenth century. Further on, he argues that it was contemporary furniture, not antique, that had lapsed into this bad taste; thus he leaves open the possibility that original eighteenth-century furnishings might avoid such grave condemnation.

Writing on the need to reform contemporary decoration, Edith Wharton also tackled the question of taste, arguing that what was satisfactory depended on the appropriate relationship between the object and the interior.⁵⁶ In her attempt to reform the interior from the excesses of historic revivals, she brought a different approach from those who, like Passavant, only saw excessive ornamentation in French furnishings. She could be forgiving of French design, but only when used as originally intended: ‘when the rocaille manner was at its height, the main lines of a room were seldom allowed to follow the capricious movement of the ornamental accessories.’⁵⁷ As long as the individual piece of furniture was subordinate to the overall decoration of the room, for Wharton the style could indeed be French. In her attempt to reform the decoration of the contemporary interior, she therefore emphasised a new understanding of good taste: that each piece placed in an interior should be considered in relation to its importance to the room as a whole.

Wealth and Ostentation

In spite of the condemnation from critics, the French style was found in the drawing rooms of both town and country houses. Hermann von Pückler-Muskau, writing in 1831, offered one very plausible reason for the success of the French style in Britain, namely that it was ‘very consistent in a country where the nobility grows more and more like that of the time of Louis the Fourteenth.’⁵⁸ One motive would seem to be that British aristocrats adopted the French style as appropriate to their new status as victors of the Napoleonic Wars, and thus that they were the inheritors of the grandeur of eighteenth-century France. By the 1820s George IV, the creator of Windsor, could be said to have absorbed and taken over French decoration—despite having been an ardent supporter of the early stages of the Revolution as a young man—installing it within the Gothic exterior of the castle, thus making it “English.” It may have been the patronage of George IV that prevented the French style from acquiring the political overtones in the nineteenth century that it had during the eighteenth century. The 5th Duke of Buccleuch, who recreated Montagu House in the 1850s with drawing rooms decorated in the rococo style featuring fine examples of eighteenth-century cabinet work and carving, was a Tory peer, as was Lord de Grey, who built Wrest Park in a similar fashion. However, aristocrats with very different political views—such as the Devonshires and other Liberals—could also espouse this style in order to display the benefits of British prosperity, the results of industry and trade. Thus the ostentation implicit in the style became a virtue; the change from previous criticism was that now the French style was seen as combining skill and excellence of craftsmanship, and thus, in its original form, it could be admired. This may be one reason why late nineteenth-century fashion concerned itself with the much closer imitation of the eighteenth century rather than the early years of the century.

The most obvious characteristic of the revived French style was its luxury, exemplified by its gilded and elaborate decoration. As has been seen this was both the most common criticism of the Ancien Régime interior, but it was also an essential part of its appeal. By the 1840s this form of decoration had become established as the accepted interior of the aristocracy. It is against this architectural revival that the taste for collecting original French furnishings must be briefly discussed. Combining architectural designs from the seventeenth to the late eighteenth century, this hybrid and eclectic revival, sometimes called the ‘Tous les Louis’-style or ‘old French style’⁵⁹ appeared in the great London mansions and palaces, establishing it as an accepted decoration for the richest members of the aristocracy. One of the first examples was created for the Duchess of Rutland by Benjamin Dean Wyatt and Matthew Cotes Wyatt at Belvoir Castle. Using panelling from eighteenth-century Parisian salons, the architects created a reception room for the duchess combining the antique panels with modern interpretations of a ceiling from Louis XIV’s Versailles.⁶⁰ Benjamin Wyatt went on to work for the Duke of York for his new house in St. James’s Park (now Lancaster House), which was then taken over and finished by the richest peer of his generation, George Granville Leveson-Gower, Marquess of Stafford and later 1st Duke of Sutherland (1758–1833),⁶¹ while his brother, Philip, created equally splendid interiors for the Marquess of Londonderry at Wynyard Park (1822–8) at a cost of £102,097 12s 0d.⁶² When George IV had the state rooms of Windsor redecorated by his architect, another member of the Wyatt family, Sir Jeffry Wyatville, added the seal of royal patronage of the style.

An early collector of French furniture, George IV, passionate in his interest in French politics and art, was certainly one of the most influential in the drive to display antique furniture in his newly decorated, grandiose interiors (Fig. 7.3). From a young man and throughout his life, he expended huge sums on French porcelain and furniture from the eighteenth century and his purchases of French works of art, set in the newly created rooms at Windsor Castle or Buckingham Palace, created a standard that continued until the end of the century. Ferdinand de Rothschild, for example, stated in his memoires that he modelled himself on George IV and William Beckford.⁶³ William Beckford (1760–1844) also had strong links to Paris before the Revolution. One of the most notable collectors of the early nineteenth century and considered one of the chief arbiters of taste in his lifetime, he had lived in Paris until the outbreak of the Revolution.⁶⁴ George Watson Taylor, a newly rich Jamaica sugar merchant, furnished his two homes with the finest examples of French furniture. The extravagant lifestyle and spending of his wife’s fortune by Pole-Tylney-Long-Wellesley, nephew to the Marquess of Wellesley, led to the sale of Wanstead House in 1823. The Watson Taylor and Wanstead House sales were important because they give evidence to the major role French furniture had in the decoration of grand London and country houses early in the century, when they were particularly associated with the furnishing of the principal state rooms, such as the state drawing room, the grand saloon or other such rooms intended for entertainment and display.

As the century progressed, emulation by the new wealthy—the new plutocrats of whom there were certainly an enormous number—was also a form of overtaking and outdoing Ancien Régime prototypes and possibly even the aristocrats from whom so many bought houses. The decoration and furnishing of these houses thus came to be associated with general ideas of aristocratic splendour, as it was suitable for entertaining and for the lavish parties given in these houses (Fig. 7.4). As Passavant remarked about Gower House: ‘There is something in these wreaths of curling leaves and twisted ends, especially when covered with the most gorgeous gilding, which attracts the eye more than the simple forms of pure taste.’⁶⁵ Visitors all cite opulence and ostentatious display as the key features of these interiors, noting that they were finer than the original French models. Henri Bischoffsheim’s palace in Mayfair, previously the home of Lord Bute (an eighteenth-century aristocratic family), was described by contemporaries as a Versailles in miniature. The interiors of Alfred de Rothschild (1842–1918) were considered to be finer than the originals at Chantilly. However, diaries written at the time also show that this display of wealth was as much envied and admired as denigrated. A telling comment about Algernon Borthwick, 1st Baron of Glenesk (1830–1908) and owner of the Morning Post, gives part of the rationale for the wealthy: ‘He is the friend and host of his Sovereign, not because he owns the Daily Telegraph but because he lives like a lord, and with lords and possesses first class shooting.’ The plutocrats of the late nineteenth century, who had made their money in manufacture, brewing, railroads, shipping, banking—whether British, South-African, American or Jewish—could choose the style of the French eighteenth century and know that they were living at the same level of luxury as the royalty and aristocracy of the past. Ferdinand de Rothschild, who supported the Liberal government and as a Jew fought for Jewish emancipation, was a great admirer of French art and culture although not of its politics. For him the rise of the new rich created ‘a new centre of attraction (that) has been formed on the ruins of the old, produced by the very action of the democracy.’ Through their collections they could offer examples of taste and discernment, which could even ‘lead to the social and political development of a future age.’⁶⁶ Ferdinand bought his treasures at aristocratic sales as part of the inevitable process of democracy. Nonetheless, he too used Waddesdon to entertain the society of his day, including the king. However, for Ferdinand there was another appeal of collecting French eighteenth-century works of art. Modelling himself on George IV and William Beckford, he saw himself as a prince of connoisseurship with the wealth to surround himself by the finest objects.

Skill and Finish

For Ferdinand de Rothschild, as for George IV, the eighteenth century in France was the period when the arts reached their peak. The names of André Charles Boulle and Riesener brought the English collector directly into the salons and elegant society of the eighteenth century, and for many French luxury goods represented the highest quality. The descriptions of furniture by Boulle and Riesener always emphasised the quality of the workmanship as well as the elegance, magnificence and costly qualities they held. It is perhaps not surprising that at a time when painters and art critics admired the detailed execution of such artists as Maclise or Mulready, Landseer or Lord Leighton, the same attributes were admired in furniture.⁶⁷

An added dimension was given to the taste and acquisition of French decorative furniture when national pride was identified with excellence in the arts. Success in the arts was part of the nationalist competition for excellence. For example, in 1875, when debating the proposal for the Royal Academy to exhibit in the Philadelphia International exhibition, the arguments put forward to the Privy Council to support the costs of the exhibit were that ‘British Art has hitherto made a very poor show at all International Exhibitions, while foreign countries like France and Belgium have always been well represented; and the result is that whereas Belgian and French pictures are well-known and command a sale all over Europe, English Pictures are but little known and esteemed out of England.’⁶⁸ This was also the concern for the decorative arts, where there were frequent representations that England needed to improve its quality of design in order to compete with other countries. Emulation of French furniture was considered by some, though by no means all, critics to be a way to provide inspiration for contemporary British design.

Ferdinand de Rothschild described the French Revolution as bringing to England ‘the priceless and countless works of art, the heirlooms of centuries.’ Moreover, for him, through this ‘dissemination of ancient and foreign works of art […] the multitude have been made conversant of their beauty and usefulness, that has opened out a new vista of refinement and industry.’⁶⁹ As a result England had become the centre of this market. Ferdinand thus combined the most admired qualities of the period—excellence in workmanship and beauty of design—with their beneficial influence on British life and culture. In this he was followed by John Jones, whose bequest to the Victoria and Albert Museum of his collection of French works of art was made to bring these qualities before the English public.⁷⁰ In the catalogue describing the collection, the author goes out of his way to show how Jones was contributing to the nation’s interest by providing works of inestimable value, both artistic and financial. Through this donation, it was argued, Britain could reach the same levels of quality as her competitors (Fig. 7.5).

When Edith Wharton emphasised the fact that, in the past, works of art were deemed valuable because of their design and not because of their workmanship, she implicitly referred to the dominant emphasis on skill and manufacture as the chief aesthetic value. In fact this may account for another paradox, which is that very often modern copies were priced more highly than the antiques, partly because of the contemporary costs of the craft and partly because the modern would be newer, more lavish and possibly more comfortable.

The emphasis on finish and skill of original eighteenth-century French decorative arts seems crucial in accounting for the taste for French decorative arts and sets it apart from other historical revivals of the nineteenth century, placing the collecting of French works of art within a national British demand for finish and perfection. Lady Dilke, in her introduction to the furniture catalogue of the newly created Wallace Collection, furthermore separated the political conditions under which French eighteenth-century furniture was produced and emphasised that:

These are considerations which one would desire to put in the first place before the reader to whom this introduction is addressed. Because at the present time—when the works of the eighteenth century and especially the latter half of that century are inordinately popular—it is necessary to insist on the fact that their chief claim to admiration lies in the measure of the style and distinction which they have attained in virtue of the taste and admirable training of their makers. This is the lesson which the great store, garnered within these walls, is aptly calculated to teach. Furthermore I would say that beautiful things may be rare and costly, but rarity and cost are not in themselves excellencies.

The truth is that the exact appreciation of work, which in all its varied forms is the product of finished skill perfected in historic traditions and controlled by critical tastes, requires incessant and steadily directed effort of the judgment and constant discipline of the powers of observation.⁷¹

Cosmopolitanism: The French Style as an Expression of National Pride

In 1886 T.H. Escott, writing under the guise of a foreign visitor to England, commented:

British cosmopolitanism shows itself in its rapid assimilation of the social ideas of other countries and in its heroic struggle to rise superior to the hampering restrictions of insular respectability. True it still possesses its own excellent common sense, but even this immense virtue is beguiled by the desire of those who possess it to prove that they are without its prejudices. London society is thus a society in a state of solution.⁷²

The use of the term ‘cosmopolitan’ brings another dimension to the taste for French, and indeed for foreign goods found in Britain during the nineteenth century. Arguably it underlies the enduring market for works of art at both the highest and more ordinary levels of society. One of the hallmarks of the nineteenth-century drawing room, the mixing of different types of decoration and time periods in a single space, became an example not just of wealth but also of the quality of British society. Disraeli’s somewhat mocking tone in Henrietta Temple reflects the mixed appreciation of this historical medley: ‘and then they were ushered into a drawing room of Parisian elegance: buhl cabinets, marqueterie tables, hangings of the choicest damask suspended from burnished cornices of old carving. The chairs had been rifled from a Venetian palace; the couches were part of the spoils of the French revolution.’⁷³ Disraeli’s fictional drawing room could be found in many of the houses described in this essay: few collections were as concentrated on French works of art as those of George IV, the Marquess of Hertford or Ferdinand Rothschild. More typical, as has been discussed above, collections reflected an eclectic mixture of furnishings from myriad dates and countries. At Stowe, alongside the French furnishings, there were also a striking number of Italian cabinets and tables in the drawing rooms and the rooms used for entertainment, and a German cabinet in metal marquetry placed in the state bedroom was considered one of the most important items in the sale.⁷⁴ The Hamilton Palace sale notably included important works of Italian, Russian or other continental origins alongside famous French pieces. Perhaps even more importantly, this mixing and melange of styles and materials can also be found in the sale catalogues of London houses belonging to not only the nobility, but also those described as ‘a gentleman’ or residents in fashionable areas of central London. The catalogues of the contents of their houses repeat the same eclectic mixtures as in those of the greater. Thus in sale catalogues, in addition to the concentration on French decorative arts, one also finds antiques from other countries, particularly Italy.⁷⁵

Justifying, or at least explaining, the practice of displaying and living in surroundings which were eclectic in their style and international in their origin, should be seen within the context of the debate about Britain’s international position in the world. It is by drawing on the discussions about cosmopolitanism that the resolution of the appropriation of a foreign style to formulate a British identity can be addressed. The term, as has been extensively discussed in recent writings on Victorian literature and identity, has many contradictory facets related to contemporary political and economic debates.⁷⁶ Linked strongly to the debate over national identity, the issues of patriotism and nationalism and their relationship to the ideal of the “citizen of the world” developed strongly in the early nineteenth century. ‘Cosmopolitanism’ as a term was used by Coleridge in opposition to nationalism in The Friend in 1809.⁷⁷ At the same time, for the Edinburgh Review a cosmopolitan understanding of politics was based on an international approach to economics.⁷⁸ As it appeared in the writings of John Stuart Mill, in 1848 the term was given a more qualified, even negative use, on the one occasion he refers to cosmopolitanism itself: ‘A tendency may, even now, be observed towards such a state of things; capital is becoming more and more cosmopolitan.’⁷⁹ He continued to argue that such cosmopolitan freedom may not be possible in the unequal economic world of the British Empire. Mill’s negative use of the word was not taken up by a number of Victorian writers, many of whom used the term to argue for a more universal and international understanding of the world.⁸⁰ The term ‘cosmopolitan,’ as can be seen in the several journals that used it in their titles, could be used for various purposes and agendas, as the different stances in their editorial perspectives demonstrate. The short-lived Cosmopolitan Review (1861) followed the universal principles in the term; its writings aimed at bringing harmony to European policies. The weekly publication Cosmopolitan (1865–76) held a more imperialist viewpoint, writing about the English colonies. Cosmopolis: An International Review (1896–8), on the other hand, was more ambitious and international in its scope, trying to create networks between cities by publishing articles about the arts in Paris, London and New York.⁸¹

The concept of cosmopolitanism has not traditionally been linked with the types of interiors described above, but rather with the reform movements for English taste. Both Mary Haweis and her contemporary Lucy Orrinsmith wrote guides on interior decoration for the homeowner,⁸² arguing that drawing on the past or from different cultures brought individuality to the home and that such eclecticism could achieve the highest form of decoration. These treatises were intended to deal with exactly the mixture of different styles by showing how, through careful disposition, a well-balanced interior could be achieved in the readers’ homes. Judith Neiswander argues that this emphasised the need for individuals to show their individuality and as such was linked to the liberal movements at the end of the nineteenth century and to the concept of free trade. Cosmopolitanism thus manifested itself in the choice of objects to decorate the interior, objects which came from all over the world.⁸³ The type of cosmopolitan interior argued by Neiswander to have been part of a liberal, aesthetic creation was certainly far from the historicist interiors in which Boulle furniture, Italian cabinets and carved console tables enriched an already opulent room, possibly even one decorated with French Louis XV boiseries, such as those at Waddesdon Manor or the London townhouses already described. Although these writers, espousing the freedom to choose the best examples from all parts of the world, did not include examples of the French style—far from it—the very arguments involved in presenting the virtues of a cosmopolitan, free-ranging approach to design provided opportunities for critics to accept certain elements of French furniture, in particular the skill of artisans from the past.

Furthermore, cosmopolitanism could be linked to Britain’s destiny and importance. Thus in the discussion which surrounded the Great Exhibition, for example, abundant use could be made of Kant’s rhetoric of world peace, turning it to argue that Britain, with its industrial supremacy, would lead the world towards its egalitarian destiny—not least by aligning its territories with the progressive trajectory of European civilisation. ‘What is more natural than that the first exhibition of the Works of Industry of all Nations should take place among a people which beyond every other in the world is composed of all nations’ was only one of many such statements of pride in the wealth and cosmopolitanism of the nation.⁸⁴ It is in this sense of cosmopolitanism that the collection of the Ancien Régime may be most closely associated. For the owners of these mansions, the mixture of antiques from international sources reflected cosmopolitanism as an expression of pride and national supremacy. The drawing rooms of the English could thus demonstrate the power of the British nation to own works of art from all countries, united under one roof. Whatever one’s means, cosmopolitanism created the final stage in British perception of the revived French style, placing taste, wealth and national pride on display in the drawing room.

Conclusion

The long-standing emulation of French style, already well established in the eighteenth century, gave it an internationalist acceptability, which during the nineteenth century came to stand for wealth and luxury. In England emulation was characterised by an interest in antique works of art; thus eighteenth-century French furniture played a significant role in the interiors of the great houses. The motives to collect French furniture meant that the market continued long after its beginnings in the first part of the century. Obviously an important factor in the fashion and taste for furnishing houses in this style involved issues of emulation and copying. Nonetheless the choice to acquire French furniture and works of art signalled more than mere copying. French and later British dealers had pushed the market for French works of art onto the English scene immediately after the Revolution and maintained that market throughout the century. The connections between English and French dealers made high quality pieces available to British collectors, while in France there was no real market until decades later. However, the enduring success of the French style in the drawing rooms of Britain had deeper roots, thus ensuring a continuous demand for eighteenth-century French works of art by not only the wealthiest in the land, but also by those who aspired to emulate their taste. Through their ready acceptance of the French style as an expression of their position, English aristocrats appropriated the art of their enemy, paradoxically by giving it both an English as well as an international meaning. The desire to emulate and to appropriate the style of the Ancien Régime was based on various and sometimes conflicting motives, but its importance in the formation of the British sense of identity must be uniformly appreciated. The style of the Ancien Régime became the style of the plutocrats of the late nineteenth century who were both British and international. It thus represented a recognised form of wealth and taste both internationally and nationally. As such it can be argued that the reasons for acquiring French works of art moved beyond emulation to deeper motives of pride in the cosmopolitan position of Britain, in which the best of both Europe and the rest of the world could be brought to the country and where the British collector could rejoice in owning the finest works of art from Europe. At a time when the past provided contemporary artists with inspiration, French furniture was also expected to provide a standard to be emulated by British craftsmen. Through its emphasis on the combination of skill and design, French furniture appealed to the nineteenth-century collector and made it acceptable throughout society. It was this that supported the market for these works of art, making them not just collectors’ items, but fundamental to every fashionable drawing room. To quote Escott again:

There is, one is told, no waste in nature and what Paris, since the fall of the Empire, has lost, London has gained. I do not say that everyone goes to London now as all the world went to Paris once; but the British capital today approaches nearer to the Paris of fifteen or twenty years ago than any other capital of the world. London is not the most beautiful, the most splendid or even the most convenient city but it is pre-eminently the smart metropolis of Europe.⁸⁵