Savonnerie Manufactory
The Savonnerie-Manufaktur ( French Manufacture de la Savonnerie ) was a royal manufactory for the production of knotted carpets in the 17th and 18th centuries . The manufacture has been nationally managed by the French Mobilier since 1965 . She runs workshops in Lodève and Paris under the direction of the Gobelin Manufactory . Their name goes back to their long-term accommodation in a former soap factory (French: savon ) at the foot of the Chaillot hill in Paris.
Based on the Paris model, manufactories for knotted textiles were founded all over Europe in the 18th century , including in Bonn , Mannheim , Heidelberg , Munich , Vienna and Madrid . The term "Savonnerie" is still used today as a name for textiles knotted in Europe (carpets, wall hangings, furniture coverings).
history
prehistory
The establishment of the Savonnerie manufactory goes back to Henry IV , who sought to expand and strengthen French handicrafts at the beginning of the 17th century . For this purpose, he had living and working rooms set up on the ground floor of the Great Gallery, which connected the Louvre Palace with the Tuileries Palace , which he made available to selected artisans. On January 4, 1608, the king signed a document in favor of Pierre Dupont (1560–1640), which granted the favorite Maria de 'Medicis the privilege of accommodation in the Louvre. In the following years he was also awarded the post of tapissier ordinaire du Roi for "carpets from Turkey and in the style of the Levant " (" tapis de Turquie et façons de Levant" ), as he himself published in 1632 La stromatourgie ou de l'excellence de la manufacture des tapits dits de Turquie wrote. Although Dupont claimed the "invention" of the knotting technique in France, it is assumed that he received the necessary information from a member of the tapissiers sarrazinois guild , which had been knotting carpets in this way in France since the 12th century.
Around 1609/10, Maria de 'Medici converted a deficit soap factory at the foot of Chaillot Hill - for example where the Palais de Tokyo can be found today - into an orphanage where orphans and foundlings were to learn a trade. In addition to a cloth weaving mill, Simon Lourdet (approx. 1590–1666), a former apprentice of Dupont, settled in the old soap factory before September 1626, who let orphans work for low wages in his workshop for “Turkish carpets”. Despite the rivalry between the two businessmen Dupont and Lourdet, an equal partnership was agreed in September 1626, and just one year later a royal decree (privilège) guaranteed them a monopoly on the manufacture of all types of carpets and upholstery "of the Levant". Associated with this was the obligation to set up comparable factories in several French cities and to employ the orphans there. In 1671, the Dupont family's workshop finally moved to the Savonnerie factory. Lourdet's workshops continued to be known primarily for the size of their pieces, while Dupont's workshops for the delicacy of their work (only here, in some cases, silk was used for the pile stitches).
The royal manufactory (1673–1791)
While Colbert , who was responsible for expanding the royal factories under Louis XIV , had granted Philippe Lourdet all of his father's privileges again in 1667, the king himself only intervened five years later. In 1673 he took over the old soap factory from the previous owner, the Hôpital Général , and turned Lourdet and Dupont's workshops into a royal manufacture. The workshops then experienced their peak phase in the following twenty years. The production of a series of thirteen carpets for the Galerie d'Apollon (delivered in 1667) and 93 carpets for the Great Gallery of the Louvre (1668–1683; one carpet was never completed) based on designs by Charles Le Brun is regarded as the greatest masterpiece . Le Brun, who also designed the ceilings, adapted the patterns and cassettes of the ceilings and carpets to each other. However, the carpets were never used as intended, as Louis XIV had already made Versailles the seat of government when they were finished.
As for the other royal manufactories, the end of the 17th and the beginning of the 18th centuries meant a difficult economic phase due to wars that did not end until 1712, when Louis XIV granted the Savonnerie Manufactory extensive rights similar to those of the Gobelin Manufactory . Although the Savonnerie continued to produce throughout the 18th century, it could no longer follow up on their wedding in terms of quality and appreciation: as with the tapestry manufactory, the atelier managers (entrepreneurs) were under pressure from Jacques-Germain Soufflot and the Marquis de Marigny , the person in charge of the Bâtiments du Roi , to work more economically, which among other things led to the fact that wages were sharply reduced. However, since the knotters were paid per dizaine , ie per square of 10 × 10 knots, they tried to fill the height of the dizaine with only six to four rows of knots with threefold thread and hardly tapped knots . In this way, the number of rows of knots per aune decreased from 460 in the second half of the 17th century to only 200 rows a hundred years later.
After the French Revolution
The French Revolution brought production into a crisis for some time and finally to a standstill, but production was resumed already under the consulate . Under Napoleon , the Savonnerie was declared an imperial manufacture, which now also carried out large orders for the new ruler. This system was adopted at the time of the restoration , but in 1826 the Savonnerie finally had to give up its premises and administratively integrate itself into the tapestry manufactory. Technically, however, the two factories remained separate and still are today. Like the Gobelin Manufactory, the Savonnerie Manufactory today mainly produces on behalf of the French state, for example for embassies, ministries, the Élysée Palace and castles.
technology
Dupont adapted the technique of carpet knotting with the Turkish knot (also called symmetrical or Giordes knot ) for the Savonnerie Manufactory . The knotted carpets are made on a vertical loom on a wool chain by knotting in woolen (rarely silk) pile stitches that are tied in knot after knot across the entire width of the carpet. The process is accelerated with an elongated knife (tranche-fil) : several knots are tied in a row above the knife and then severed together. The entire pile is cut to an even length with scissors , so that its typical velvety surface is created. When a row of knots is completed, two weft threads made of hemp or linen are woven in a plain weave to hold the knots in place. In contrast to the knitting technique , here the face is worked towards the front of the carpet, while the cardboard box is attached to the loom above the head.
In the 18th century, looms in two different sizes were used in the Savonnerie Manufactory, the larger for making carpets, the smaller for covering furniture, such as screens , chimney screens and sofas .
literature
- Pierre Dupont: La stromatourgie ou de l'excellence de la manufacture des tapits dits de Turquie . Paris 1633.
- Alfred Darcel / Jules Guiffrey (eds.): La stromatourgie de Pierre Dupont. Documents relatifs à la fabrication des tapis de Turquie en France au XVIIe siècle . Charavay frères, Paris 1882 ( gallica.fr [accessed September 28, 2015]).
- Louis Braquenié, Jean Magnac: La manufacture de la Savonnerie du Quai De Chaillot . Paris 1924.
- Madeleine Jarry: The Carpets of the Manufacture de la Savonnerie . Leigh-on-Sea 1966.
- Evelyn Dreczko: The Electoral Cologne and Electoral Palatinate Savonneriemanufaktur (1715–1798). With an introductory overview of hand-knotted carpets in Europe . (Diss.), Bonn 1978.
- Pierre Verlet: The Savonnerie. Its history. The Waddesdon Collection . Office du Livre, Friborg 1982, ISBN 0-7078-0082-X .
- Wolf Burchard: Savonnerie Reviewed: Charles Le Brun and the "Grand Tapis de Pied d'Ouvrage a la Turque" woven for the Grande Galerie at the Louvre . In: Furniture History . tape XLVIII , 2012, p. 1-43 .
Web links
- Official website of Mobilier National and the Gobelins, Beauvais, Savonnerie manufacturers
- Video about the Savonnerie manufacture in Lodève (youtube.com)
Individual evidence
- ↑ Evelyn Dreczko: The Electorate of Cologne and Palatine Savonneriemanufaktur (1715-1798). With an introductory overview of hand-knotted carpets in Europe . Bonn 1978, p. 16 ff .
- ^ Pierre Dupont: La stromatourgie ou de l'excellence de la manufacture des tapits dits de Turquie . Paris 1633.
- ^ Alfred Darcel / Jules Guiffrey (eds.): La stromatourgie de Pierre Dupont. Documents relatifs à la fabrication des tapis de Turquie en France au XVIIe siècle . Charavay frères, Paris 1882, p. 49 ( gallica.fr [accessed September 28, 2015]).
- ↑ Darcel / Guiffrey, pp. V – vii.
- ^ Pierre Verlet: The Savonnerie. Its history. The Waddesdon Collection . Office du Livre, Friborg 1982, ISBN 0-7078-0082-X , p. 32 .
- ↑ Verlet, p. 33.
- ↑ Verlet, p. 35.
- ↑ Verlet, pp. 178-180.
- ↑ a b Verlet, p. 36.
- ↑ Verlet, pp. 54–55.