Pair of varnished tin potpourri dishes, Paris circa 1760

A rare pair of potpourri jars, each consisting of a bottle bucket adorned with a lid and a mount in finely chased and mercury-gilded bronze.

The tin buckets are decorated with a Martin varnish finish using gold and copper powder, highlighted with red lacquer on a black background.

This decoration, in imitation of Chinese art, depicts pagodas and figures in traditional dress on rocky mounds.

Our bottle buckets are transformed into potpourri jars using an elaborate gilt-bronze mount. This mount includes a base with feet decorated with acanthus scrolls and an openwork frieze, all connected by side handles ending in shell-shaped carrying handles.

The black lacquered bronze lid is surmounted by a knob that serves as a handle; it is composed of an openwork whiplash acanthus scroll adorned with small flowers. In very good condition, with minor losses to the decoration and a slight dent in the openwork rim.

Parisian work from the Louis XV period, circa 1760-1770.

Dimensions:

Total height: 27 cm; diameter: 21 cm

Height: bottle buckets: 15 cm

Our opinion:

The pair of potpourri jars we are presenting is unique to our knowledge; it demonstrates the full creative genius of Parisian merchants during the reign of Louis XV. While many pieces of Chinese porcelain were repurposed from their utilitarian uses to be mounted as cachepots using a mount similar to ours, this is the first time we have encountered tin bottle buckets mounted as potpourri jars with a bronze rim that allows the fragrance of dried flowers to diffuse. Objects made of varnished sheet metal imitating Chinese designs enjoyed great success between 1765 and 1770, but due to very high production costs, the few factories that sprang up in Paris, such as "La Petite Pologne" and "Au Petit Dunkerque," went bankrupt within a few years.
The pieces produced by these establishments satisfied a clientele eager for a fantasized Orient, but also the mercers who diverted some of this production.
The pair we are presenting is a fine example of this fashion for Chinese designs that swept through France in the 18th century, but it primarily demonstrates the work of these mercers who created unique, made-to-order pieces by hiring the greatest designers and bronze workers of the reign of Louis XV.