Object Description
A Pair of Giltwood Carved Torchères
After the Design by Jean Pelletier
for the King’s State Apartments
Supported on incurved tripartite plinths, the pair of torchères hand-carved in the French style, with three scrolled legs and a triangular tapering shaft adorned with descending husks, the circular gadrooned tops on a spreading acanthus leaf neck support. Together with their striking crystal and ormolu five-light girandoles.
English, circa 1890
Designed by Jean Pelletier (fl. c.1681-d.1705), a French émigré who worked for the English royal family, in the Louis XIV ‘Roman’ fashion popularised by Daniel Marot in the late 17th century.
The candle-stands can still be admired in Hampton Court Palace today, in King William III’s State Apartments. Pelletier’s important commission for the palace also included tables and mirrors, at the great cost of nearly £600, roughly equivalent to over two million dollars today.