A Fine Louis XVI Style Gilt-Bronze and Moulded-Glass Twenty-Four Light Chandelier

Object Description

A Fine Louis XVI Style Gilt-Bronze and Moulded-Glass Twenty-Four Light Chandelier by La Compagnie des Cristalleries de Baccarat.

Moulded ‘Baccarat’ signature to the drip trays.

The chandelier has a circular corona mounted with Acanthus and hung with drops and swags above a circular cage frame issuing tiers of scrolling acanthus wrapped candle branches with glass drip-pans and circular nozzles, interspersed by finely cast putti figures. The chandelier is hung overall with faceted drops and terminals.

The twenty-four light model, like the present example is illustrated in Baccarat’s ‘Tarif des Articles d’Eclairage’, from the turn of the century, as ‘Lustre Série E.193’. It is priced at 970 old French Francs with candles and 1044 ff. with shades. A further variation with bronze arms and glass shades is illustrated as Série E.460.

French, Circa 1890.

Object History

Anne and Gordon Getty, Wheatland, Sacremento Valley, California.

Baccarat is the world’s leading manufacturer of crystalware. Founded in 1764 under the patronage of Louis XV as Renault et Compagnie, the firm became known as the Compagnie des Cristalleries de Baccarat during the nineteenth Century.

The company began to flourish at the beginning of the Nineteenth Century, as the effects of the Napoleonic Wars abated, and its reputation was consolidated by the official approval from various sovereigns and heads of state. At the 1823 Exposition Nationale in Paris, it was Baccarat’s crystalware that Louis XVIII was said to have particularly admired, appreciating its ‘beautiful workmanship’.

Object Literature

‘La Compagnie des Cristalleries de Baccarat, Tarif des Articles d’Eclairage’, (Paris), Edition 1903-4.
Curtis, Jean-Louis. Baccarat, Thames and Hudson, (London), 1992.
Meyer, Jonathan. Great Exhibitions: London, New York, Paris, Philadelphia, 1851-1900, Antique Collector’s Club, (Woodbridge, UK), 2006; p.263.
Michaela Lerch and Dominique Morel, Baccarat: La Légende du Cristal, Paris, Petit Palais Exhibition Catalogue. 2014.

Object Details