The Chinese Room in Claydon House is the most elaborate Chinoiserie interior surviving in Britain. It was designed in 1769 by Luke Lightfoot. Above each door is a pagoda motif supported by Chinese figures. Oriental faces also appear among the flowers around the chimney-piece. The most remarkable part of the room is the tea alcove which is painted with a latticework design and covered in an abundance of Chinoiserie details.
Style Guide:
Chinoiserie
Chinoiserie, from
'chinois' the French for Chinese, was a style inspired by art and
design from China, Japan and other Asian countries. In the 18th
century porcelain, silk and lacquerware imported from China and Japan
were extremely fashionable. This led many British designers and
craftsmen to imitate Asian designs and to create their own fanciful
versions of the East. The style was at its height from 1750 to 1765.
Characteristics
Chinese figures
People in Chinese
clothes are a feature of the Chinoiserie style. Sometimes these
figures were copied directly from Chinese objects, but more
frequently they originated in the designer's imagination.
Fantastic landscapes
In 18th-century
Britain, China seemed a mysterious, far-away place. Chinoiserie drew
on this exotic image. Objects featured fantastic landscapes with
fanciful pavilions and fabulous birds, sometimes inspired by those
depicted on actual Chinese objects.
Dragons
To British designers
Chinese and Japanese dragons summed up all that was strange and
wonderful about the East. These mythical beasts became common
Chinoiserie motifs.
Pagodas
The sweeping lines
of the roofs of Chinese pagodas were incorporated into a wide range
of Chinoiserie objects.
People
Sir William Chambers
(1723-1796)
Sir William Chambers
is best known as a classical architect, but in his garden buildings
he worked in a great variety of styles including Chinoiserie. As a
young man Chambers travelled in the East, visiting the great Chinese
port of Canton (Guangzhou). In 1757 he published Designs of Chinese
Buildings which contained his observations. He designed a number of
Chinoiserie buildings for Kew Gardens. The pagoda, aviary and bridge
were not based on any real Chinese examples, but Chambers did aim for
accurate imitations which contrast with the rather fanciful creations
of his contemporaries.
Jean Pillement
(1728-1808)
Jean Pillement was a
French artist who settled in London in 1750. He was a major designer
of Chinoiserie decoration, who published two influential collections
of prints - A New Book of Chinese Ornaments, published in 1755, One
Hundred and Thirty Figures, Ornaments and Some Flowers in the Chinese
Style of 1767. Pillement's fanciful images of Chinese figures,
pavilions, flowers and foliage were copied and adapted for all kinds
of objects including ceramics, wallpaper, furniture and most
especially textiles.
William (1703-1763)
and John Linnell (1729-1796)
Father and son
William and John Linnell were very successful 18th-century furniture
manufacturers. In about 1754 they designed one of the earliest
Chinoiserie interiors in Britain, the Chinese bedroom commissioned by
the 4th Duke and Duchess of Beaufort for Badminton House in
Gloucestershire. The most dramatic piece of furniture the Linnells
made for the room was the bed. This typifies the Chinoiserie style
with its pagoda-like canopy embellished with dragons, its decorative
latticework and its imitation lacquer surface in red, blue and gold.
Sir William
ChambersJean PillementWilliam and John LinnellJohn Linnell
Buildings and
Interiors
Kew Gardens, Surrey
The botanical
gardens at Kew, on the outskirts of London, were established in 1759
by the Dowager Princess Augusta. She employed the architect William
Chambers to create a number of exotic Chinese and Moorish style
buildings. His famous pagoda remains the most celebrated example of
Chinoiserie in Britain. The publication of Chambers' plans and views
of Kew in 1762 started a fashion for Chinese-style gardens.
www.kew.org
Chinese Room,
Claydon House
The Chinese Room in
Claydon House is the most elaborate Chinoiserie interior surviving in
Britain. It was designed in 1769 by Luke Lightfoot. Above each door
is a pagoda motif supported by Chinese figures. Oriental faces also
appear among the flowers around the chimney-piece. The most
remarkable part of the room is the tea alcove which is painted with a
latticework design and covered in an abundance of Chinoiserie
details.
www.nationaltrust.org.uk/claydon
Related Style
Rococo 1730 - 1760
Chinoiserie was
closely related to the Rococo style. Asymmetry, scrolling forms and
an element of fantasy characterise both styles. Rococo and
Chinoiserie styles were often used together in interior decoration or
even combined in a single object.
Claydon House is a
country house in the Aylesbury Vale, Buckinghamshire, England, near
the village of Middle Claydon. It was built between 1757 and 1771 and
is now owned by the National Trust.
The exterior of the
house is quite austere — seven bays in total, on two floors, with a
three-bayed central prominent elevation surmounted by a pediment. The
fenestration is of sash windows. (The ground floor windows are
crowned by small round windows suggesting a non-existent mezzanine.)
The centre bay contains a large central venetian window on the ground
floor
By contrast to the
exterior the interiors are an extravaganza of rococo architecture in
its highest form. The principal rooms: the north hall, a double cube
room (50 ft × 25 ft × 25 ft high (15.2 m × 7.6 m × 7.6 m)) may
have lost its adjoining hall under the lost dome. However, its
magnificence remains. The broken pedimented door cases are adorned
with rococo carving, by Luke Lightfoot, the most talented wood carver
of the era, who worked extensively on the great mansion. His work can
be found on the ceiling and the niches in the walls. The adjoining
saloon is slightly more restrained in its decoration. However the
ornate carving continues into the dado rails, and onto the Corinthian
columns supporting the huge venetian window. The third principal room
was redecorated as a library by Parthenope, Lady Verney in 1860. The
plaster rococo ceiling remains in all its splendour.
A staircase of
inlaid ivory and marquetry leads to the first floor. The walls of the
staircase hall are ornamented with medallions and carved garlands
reflecting the theme established in the main reception rooms. The
wrought iron balustrade of the stairs contains ironwork ears of
wheat, which rustle like the real thing as one ascends the flights.
The marvel of the
first floor is the Chinese room: one of the most extraordinary rooms
in the house if not England. Here the rococo continues, but this time
in a form known as chinoiserie — essentially a Chinese version of
the rococo decorative style. The entire room is a fantasy of carved
pagodas, Chinese fretwork, bells and temples while oriental scrolls
and swirls swoop around the walls and doors reaching a crescendo in
the temple-like canopy, which would have once contained a bed, but
now gives a throne-like importance to a divan.
Also on this floor
is a small museum dedicated to the nursing pioneer Florence
Nightingale, the sister of Parthenope, Lady Verney. In her later
years Nightingale regularly stayed at the house.
No comments:
Post a Comment