THE STYLE OF THE EMPIRE. 477 



the interest inseparable from any consistent style, is largely due to the 

 work of two men, whose unbroken and lifelong friendship is one of the 

 most pleasing episodes in architectural history. Charles Percier (1764- 

 1838), son of the lodge-keeper at the revolving bridge of the Tuileries 

 Gardens, and Pierre Francois Leonard Fontaine (1762-1853) met in 

 A. F. Peyre's school; both obtained prize studentships, and spent some 

 years in Rome. On their return in 1792, the state of public affairs 

 being anything but propitious to building, Fontaine at first sought his 

 fortune as a decorative designer in London, while Percier was doing 

 similar work in Paris, but they soon obtained a joint post at the, opera 

 at Paris, giving them the control of .the scenery and costumes, and 

 were employed by the cabinetmaker, Jacob Desmalter, to make designs 

 for the furnishing of the Hall of the Convention for which he had con- 

 tracted. The two friends soon became noted for a pure classicism 

 which exactly suited the taste of the hour. They were presented by the 

 painter David to General Bonaparte, and became architects to the First 

 Consul and to the Emperor ; nor were they disowned by the Restoration, 

 though after 1814 Percier, whose health was unsatisfactory, withdrew from 

 practice to devote himself to their innumerable pupils. Like Prima- 

 ticcio and Le Brun in other centuries, they became the arbiters of taste 

 in matters great and small. Besides a large amount of architectural work 

 they gave designs for furniture and upholstery, bronzes, plate, glass and 

 china, stuffs, wall-papers and frescoes, as well as the costumes, decora- 

 tions, and illuminations for State ceremonies. They may be regarded 

 as the creators of the Empire Style, which in their hands always attained 

 a high level of merit (cf. Figs. 444, 445, and 465). 



Among the other artists whose work helped in the formation of the 

 Empire Style, the painters Jacques Louis David (1748-1825) and Pierre 

 Paul Prudhon (1758-1823), the engraver Charles Normand (1765-1840), 

 the cabinetmaker Lignereux, and the bronze-worker Thomire may be 

 mentioned. What excellence of execution the work carried out in it 

 can still boast is due in large measure to the surviving workmen trained 

 under the ancien regime. But with the disappearance of the maitrises 

 apprenticeship became rare, and it is often only too evident that the 

 traditions of craftsmanship had to a large extent been broken, and that 

 the trade product was beginning to supersede artists' work. 



Decorations by Percier and Fontaine may be seen in several of 

 the royal palaces altered for Napoleon Compiegne, Fontainebleau, 

 Trianon and at Malmaison, the Empress Josephine's country house. 

 Examples of Empire decoration also exist in the Hotel Beauharnais, 

 now the German Embassy, the Hotel de Pologne (Fig. 446), &c. 



CHANGES OF FASHION. With each change of political circumstances 

 came small changes of decorative fashion. The Republic had its 

 Phrygian caps, its bundles of fasces and lictors' axes, its oak and laurel 



