In 1913, the Parisian artist Jules-Alexandre Grün created ‘Fin de Souper’, a painting glowing with light and colour, now in the fine arts museum MUba Eugène Leroy, in Tourcoing.  It shows in sumptuous detail an animated company in conversation at the end of a soirée, the gentlemen attired for a formal occasion whilst the bejewelled smiling ladies shine in ethereal silks. One younger couple, the gentleman's hand pressed to his heart, perhaps announce their recent engagement. In the shadowy background, the walls of the room, painted or hung with tapestries, are decorated with leafy landscapes reminiscent of 18th Century romantic bowers and lovers’ trysts. Illuminated table centrepieces garlanded with flowers cast a radiance over the dining table, with its polished silver wares, fragile drinking glasses and gleaming porcelain. Silvery embellishments adorning the ladies’ dresses sparkle in the light, which also emphasises the fan and ladies’ gloves. 

Paris, the fabled 'City of Light' has long been synonymous with the luxury arts. For centuries, dazzling jewels, objets de vertu, elegant clothing, furnishings and other precious works of art crafted in the city’s myriad workshops, have delighted the eye of the most discerning and esteemed patrons. By the 19th Century, Paris was celebrated as a destination for fashionable shopping with revered couture houses and prestigious jewellers established on the Rue de la Paix and Place Vendôme. Jules-Alexandre Grün’s painting draws us into the seductive world of the Parisian beau monde during the twilight years of the Belle Epoque and heralds, despite the imminent trauma of war, a 20th Century golden age of Parisian haute couture. Yet it also honours an immense creative and enduring legacy of past centuries reaching far back to the Medieval period. The city of Paris, its luxury arts, designers and royal and noble patrons, all take centre stage in this study day, celebrating a thousand years of luminous splendour. 

Lecture 1, Paris from the Middle Ages to Renaissance

The first lecture looks at art patronage from Court and Church during the Medieval era and beyond.  Fine illuminated manuscripts show in miniature detail the magnificent Gothic architecture on the Île de la Cité, including the Royal Palace, Sainte Chapelle and Notre Dame cathedral. Paris developed as a cosmopolitan university city attracting the nobility, merchants and artisans and became an important centre for goldsmiths’ work such as bejewelled cups for the dining table, jewellery and holy reliquaries. The skilled arts of rock crystal cutting and silk-weaving developed in Medieval Paris, as did ivory carving, with small-scale sculptures, chests and mirror-cases showing episodes from the Bible or scenes of chivalry and courtly love. Precious materials such as pigments, jewels and raw silks arrived via long-distance trade routes. The designs for the famous mille-fleurs ‘Lady and the Unicorn’ tapestries in the Musée Cluny were drawn in Paris and offer tantalising glimpses into the opulence of the luxury arts of the period.

Lecture 2, Paris from the Sun King to Revolution

Versailles under the Sun King and his successors was a lavish and splendid theatre of magnificence. This ostentatious centre of Court life, along with private mansions of the nobility were destinations for many of the luxury arts made in Parisian workshops. Louis XIV’s Minister of Finance, Jean-Baptiste Colbert, encouraged the arts and crafts and during his tenure the Gobelins tapestry workshops were purchased on behalf of the crown, becoming the Manufacture Royale des Meubles de la Couronne. In these workshops, under the director Charles le Brun, fine tapestries, silver and furniture were crafted, including the exceptional marquetry furniture made by ébéniste Pierre Gole. During the 18th Century, retailers known as marchands merciers sold luxury goods sought after by an international clientèle. Smaller workshops excelled in the making of diamond jewellery, gold boxes for snuff and other objets de vertu. Such lavish extravagance would come to an end in the devastation of Revolution.

Lecture 3, Paris from Imperial Grandeur to the New Look

From the embers of Revolution emerged the grandeur of the Napoleonic era, as recorded in exquisite and glittering detail in Jacques-Louis David’s monumental painting ‘Coronation of Napoleon’ (at Notre Dame), now in the Louvre Museum. Emperor Napoleon I encouraged the arts as, in later years, did Napoleon III and his consort Empress Eugénie. The 19th Century witnessed the founding of haute couture fashion houses such as the House of Worth and the House of Paquin, their glamorous salons frequented by French high society and the ‘Dollar Princesses’ of America’s Gilded Age. Jewellers included the venerable companies Cartier, René Lalique and Henri Vever.  The study day concludes with the achievements of Coco Chanel and the debut collection of Christian Dior in 1947 known as ‘The New Look’. From that time, a new golden age of luxury and elegance dawned in Paris, The City of Light.