de Gournay’s presence at the 2019 edition of London’s celebrated Masterpiece fair again saw its hand crafted designs paired with a diverse array of displays, courtesy of some of the industry’s leading dealers of antiques, objét and decorative arts.
Across three unique installations, de Gournay showcased both the well-honed skills that typify their permanent collections, and an impressive assortment of new techniques now part of their repertoire.
Galerie Marcilhac. Photography by Ollie Hammick
Galerie Marcilhac
Félix Marcilhac, of Paris’ eponymous Galerie Marcilhac, presented his exquisite, Art Deco era pieces alongside de Gournay for a second year, this time showcasing the new ‘Deco Wisteria’ motif: a textile wallcovering embroidered in its entirety by hand.
Threaded on a Wool Sateen basecloth in a multitude of metallic textures, ‘Deco Wisteria’ employed intricate new methods achieved by de Gournay as applicable across all of their permanent collections, the result of years of creative research and experimentation, in addition to the founding of a new studio in India to further explore techniques of embellishment, embroidery and appliqué.
‘Deco Wisteria’ retains the elegance of de Gournay’s popular Japanese & Korean ‘Wisteria’ design wallpaper – its drooping flowers and pendulous branches languorously boughed across the upholstered backing – in a magnificent new incarnation of shimmering Gold.
www.marcilhacgalerie.com
James Graham-Stewart
Within the stand of London antiques dealer James Graham-Stewart, de Gournay’s ‘Earlham’ Chinoiserie wallpaper was hand painted upon a custom coloured Williamsburg background of mottled grey-green, with a textural antiquing applied also by hand.
The lively composition of thin and elegantly shaped trees, festooned with revered flowers of Chinese culture such as Peonies, Chrysanthemums and Plum Blossoms, was interspersed with oriental birds and butterflies in an earthy palette of charcoal, blues and fawn, evoking an aged character in keeping with the dealer’s broad oeuvre of speciality, ranging from 17th century pieces onwards.
James Graham-Stewart
de Gournay’s Earlham design was originally inspired by panels within the collection of the V&A Museum dating from the middle of the 18th Century – representing an amazingly well preserved example of their type. de Gournay put great efforts into maintaining the feel of these panels at their original large scale when creating the standard, shorter design height required for the majority of contemporary applications.
James Graham-Stewart
In the manner of a period property itself, the stand exterior was also hung with de Gournay’s India Tea Paper in a Verdigris tone: gently sanded and railroaded horizontally to create a regulated ‘brickwork’ effect. Named for the papers that lined tea chests returning along trade routes, often cobbled together to form larger panels, India Tea Paper offers an elegant base to Chinoiserie designs.
www.jamesgraham-stewart.com
James Graham-Stewart
Savills by 1508 London
Courtesy of one of the UK’s leading interior firms, 1508 London, and chief interior designer Ekaterina Kitaina, Estate Agents Savills looked this year to the concept of the Study and its place within the home. ‘Symphony’, one of de Gournay’s most recent additions to their Eclectic collection, was installed within framed inserts in the manner of panelling, offsetting the graphic abstract of the motif with angular borders.
Savills
The palette of cool Blues was a more subtle execution of the design, with the aluminium sections gilded upon the roughly textured ground of Empire Blue Silk Duppion muted beneath washes, though still retaining the same impressive drama in this moonlit variation.
www.1508london.com
https://www.houseandgarden.co.uk/gallery/masterpiece-london-2019
