Pre-fabricated ornamentation

Beunat, Joseph. Recueil des dessins d'ornaments d'architecture de la manufacture de Joseph Beunat. A Sarrebourg, et a Paris, Rue St. Avoye, no. 63. Contenant tout ce qui rapport a la decoration des apartments [...].

€ 6.500,00

An important trade catalogue of furniture ornament and interior decorative designs manufactured by a patented process at Beunat's factory in Sarrebourg in the Alsace. Beunat was the first to manufacture and distribute pre-fabricated moulded elements of ornamentation. His designs were in the French Empire style, pioneered by the architect duo Percier and Fontaine.

Beunat's trade catalogue shows about 800 decorative designs of friezes, panel ornaments, pilasters, capitals, mouldings, candelabras, vases, heads, mythological figures and motives, rosettes, frames for pictures and mirrors, door surrounds, etc. There are also a handful of designs of entire rooms together with floor plans. The designs were offered in plasterwork as stucco decorations for interiors, but some must also have been offered in bronze as furniture ornament. The plates are finely detailed and drawn with measurements.

This copy bears proof of Beunat's international ambitions: the plates and title-page of the trade catalogue are French, while the wrappers give all the necessary information in German. There is a German summary of the designs contained in the catalogue, as well as practical information indicating that the measurements are in French with a scale. There is also a reference to Beunat's "Erfindungs-Patent". We could not locate another copy with the German wrappers. Some of the plates are dated "1812", some "1813", the latest date is "18 December 1813". Plates nos. 83 and 85 have neat ink ms. additions. Some of the plates were engraved by Louis Marie Normand, August Montferrand, or A. P. Giraud.

An excellent copy, clean and crisp, from the Donaueschingen Fürstenberg library (their small stamp to verso of title-page).