14 
House & Garden 
1 .. m* 
The east end of a salon showing Directoire pieces. 
The two modern large chairs are covered with 
mulberry brocaded satin. A narrow silk fringe in 
mulberry and dull blue edges the chair backs as 
well as the seats 
The Revolution precipitated simplicity. 
It was the same simplicity that we find in 
the wake of every great political revolu¬ 
tion, every great upheaval of mass view¬ 
point. Marie Antoinette with her farm 
dropped a pebble into the sea and was re¬ 
sponsible for ripples, but the overwhelm¬ 
ing waves came from the eternal tides. 
Such was the mood of the Directorate. 
With the First Empire, the fluid mixture 
of circumstances and human living, 
settled, each element taking its own posi¬ 
tion in accordance with its specific grav¬ 
ity; the laws of Nature asserted them¬ 
selves and we again see living calmly side 
by side the classes in silks and satins, the 
masses in utility garb and the pauperized 
ineffectual—refuse of the other two 
classes—in the sad or glad rags of 
their respective ranks. 
Directoire Elements 
When you find yourself in a 
French interior, with painted wall 
papers instead of tapestries, furni¬ 
ture coverings and hangings of 
chintzes, with classic designs in 
place of the perishable brocades and 
damasks of the Louis, or magnifi¬ 
cent textiles of the First Empire; 
simple curtain poles (often arrow- 
shaped) not the heavy cornices of 
the Louis and the Empire; painted 
furniture with classic lines or sim¬ 
ple mahogany and chestnut, with or¬ 
naments carved and gilded or of or¬ 
molu; chair backs showing the 
graceful backward curve from seat 
to rolled-over chair top, and legs 
curving in and tapering square or 
round to the floor (a modification of 
The west end of the salon contains Direc¬ 
toire, Louis XV and Louis XVI furniture. 
The Directoire table standing near the 
sofa is a very good piece. Another per¬ 
fect example of the period is the chair with 
medallion designs in needle-work 
the classic type) you may be very 
sure that you are looking at a Di¬ 
rectoire or early Empire interior. 
As to chairs, however, this transi¬ 
tion of Directoire type shows not 
only plain straight round legs, but 
Louis XVI fluted chair legs, com¬ 
bined with the classic Egyptian and 
Greek roll to the top of the chair 
back. On the other hand, some 
chair backs are very like Louis 
XVI. Notice also that Directoire 
pilasters capped by women’s heads 
of bronze or gilded wood (often 
with a pair of small bare feet in 
gold at the base) are generally 
carved, painted and gilded, but with 
great restraint. There was a tenta¬ 
tive effort after the revolution to 
suppress the gold and paint it black. 
Empire pilasters were of mahog¬ 
any or cherry, square and tapering 
with gold or bronze head and feet. 
Winged women, swans, dolphins 
and griffins in bronze or of carved 
and gilded wood, appear in struc¬ 
tural parts of this furniture. 
Designs reproduced in every 
medium show exquisite floral ara¬ 
besques terminating in medallions and 
rosettes, and all the classic emblems, 
adapted with that delicate fantasy which 
is the antipodes of realism. It was as if 
the French artists of the time turned to a 
world of the imagination. 
Creators of the Style 
The Directoire commends itself as a 
renaissance of the classic for two reasons: 
it fell heir to the genius and technique 
of artists, designers and artisans of the 
Louis—the great art period of France; 
and, a most important fact, Perier and 
Fontaine, architects and interior decor¬ 
ators, who worked together and were 
chiefly responsible for the Directoire and 
A Directoire hall in which sofa, mirror and 
marble-top table are true to period. The black 
and white marble pedestal supporting an an¬ 
tique Italian vase was formerly in the Clyde 
Fitch collection. Curtain is antique white satin 
with gold and colored decorations 
