Boulle Counterpart Marquetry Table. Napoleon III, 19th Century

A sustained and elegant tribute to the grandiloquent style of the reign of Louis XIV, this Boulle marquetry table features tortoiseshell on a brass background on the animated and black-lacquered top and rim. It is therefore a counterpart and, with its brass pendant on a tortoiseshell background, our table must once have adorned a plush apartment, a bourgeois house or even a castle.

The top is bordered by a frieze of ovals and the rim, enhanced by central rosettes, conceals a drawer. Beautiful caryatids with fine features serve as corner drops while the feet are set in ornate bronze. The whole is in very good condition.