They were created in 1920 by Albert-Armond Rateau for the Paris apartment of Jeanne Lanvin, and I adore them. Look at the fluting!
Here they are, in situ, in a horrible grainy photo that still manages to suggest the excellence of these lost rooms. Look deep into the room ...
And their beauty would only improve with fire. For some irrational reason I gravitate to certain types of objects: lamps, paperweights, sticks, and andirons. And these are so perfect.
Perfection comes at a cost: they were sold at Rago late last year, I believe, for 60,000. And that was 20,000 under the low estimate!
More background, c/o Wikipedia:
"For this domicile, Rateau designed some remarkable 1920–22 furniture in bronze. During 1921–22, Rateau was manager of Lanvin-Sport and he also designed the Lanvin spherical La Boule perfume flaçon for Arpège about 1925–34 (originally produced by the Manufacture Nationale de Sévres). To this day, Arpège perfume containers are imprinted with Paul Iribe's gold image of 1907 of Lanvin and her daughter Marguerite. Rateau also designed Lanvin’s fashion house and managed the Lanvin-Décoration department of interior design (established 1920) in the main store on the Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré."
Oh, to have shopped in that store. The article also mentions that several rooms from this apartment were reassembled in the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris in 1985 ... does anyone know if these are sill in existence, and if so, are they missing their andirons?
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4 comments:
They do indeed still exist and underwent restoration in 2007:
http://thepeakofchic.blogspot.com/2007/06/lanvin-rooms.html
Looks like only JL's boudoir and salle de bains though, and the former has a wave-y fire screen with no andirons. Yours are spectacular, like a geyser ending in a dandelion.
Yes, aren't they marvelous? Would that they could be mine. Your description is exact: "like a geyser ending in a dandelion."
And thanks so much for the update. It's an absurd oversight that I haven't been to the museum yet, and this is yet one more excuse to go.
This post is tear-worthy! Those andirons are perfection as is that room. I'll take it all! And the bathroom in other Nicks link almost made me flatline. We need to have a 1920's caucus post haste.
60000 what? Dollars. That's nuts.
-Zane of ontario honey
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