Clocks

The French clocks rarely reached the dimensions of the English tall-case clocks. In all representative cases under Louis XIV the dignified rectilinear or tapering lines appeared. Under Louis XV shapes and ornamentation were both apt to be fantastic.

Materials

Oak. Oak was used for carved panelling and also for some of the larger carved cabinet work.

Walnut. Walnut was used both solid and for veneer.

Mahogany. Mahogany was employed more in the reign of Louis XV than before.

Veneer and Inlay Woods. Box, violetwood, laburnum, kingwood, holly, sycamore, and many others, were used for inlays, veneer and marqueterie.

Ebony. Ebony was used for some of his finest creations by Boulle and his imitators.

Tortoiseshell. Boulle used tortoiseshell extensively as a veneer into which he set his metal inlay.

Brass and White Metal. Used as an inlay in a wood ground.

Upholstery. The richest materials were used for upholstering chairs, stools and sofas, which were often protected by slip covers.

Decorative Processes

Nearly every decorative process imaginable was employed by the furniture makers of the Louis Quatorze and Louis Quinze periods. The following were the most usual.

Carving. Carving both in the round and in relief was employed with hard woods and also with soft woods that were to be painted and gilt.

Inlay. Intricate inlay of an immense variety of woods was highly popular.

Maequetebie. Marqueterie was much used and was frequently of a more pictorial and connected character than either English or Dutch work of the same kind.

Veneer. The art of veneering was largely practised.

Gilding. Both gilding and parcel gilding enjoyed continuous vogue for the enrichment of furniture.

Painting. Painting framework in monotint to be enlivened by gilding, or painting panels, or running designs, were methods of decoration often resorted to successfully.

Turning. The standard importance of turning was overshadowed by the wealth of other elaborate and brilliant processes for the decoration of furniture.

Lacquer. Lacquering was a favourite decorative process extensively practised. Its long continued popularity and the experiments of the French lacquer makers eventually led to the production of the famous Vernis-Martin in the reign of Louis XV. A fuller notice of the Vernis-Martin work occurs in the chapter on "Painted Furniture."

Boulle Work. This is the name applied to the famous decorative process of metal and tortoiseshell inlay elaborated by the ingenious craftsman Boulle in the reign of Louis XIV. Boulle had many imitators but his name has always been attached to the process, nevertheless, though at times one sees it in the corrupted form "buhl," a spelling which has no justification.

The process consisted of veneering a suitably prepared and coloured surface of wood with a coat of transparent tortoiseshell. This shell veneer was further adorned with an inlay of delicate and elaborate metal tracery. As an alternative to this inlay of metal on a shell ground, and from motives of economy to prevent a waste of precious material, the reverse of this process was often practised, that is, an inlay of tortoise-shell in a metal ground. This was called Counter-Boulle.