Monday, April 11, 2022

Toile de Jouy: French By Design


 From OuiPlease via Bright:

In 1759, Christophe-Phillipe Oberkampf discovered the ban on cotton was being lifted. Oberkampf had been working in his family’s textile business for years and decided to open his own factory. In 1760, Christophe Phillipe Oberkampf opened a factory in Jouy-en-Josas which was one of the first major producers of toile. Originally the design scenes were carved on woodblocks and printed in only one color onto a cream or white fabric.

Oberkampf was influenced by Rococo art and worked with designer and engraver Jean-Baptist Huet whose designs featured vignettes, pastoral scenes, and European mythology. The repeated designs were simple and classic and in a single color. In addition to these romantic pastoral patterns, many toile patterns told a story or reference major events.

Toile de Jouy was the fashionable choice in the 18th century for clothing and interiors – even Marie-Antoinette visited Oberkampf’s factory in Jouy-en-Josas. Although the word toile means fabric, the word toile has evolved to also refer to the original design aesthetic of the fabric. The elements were traditionally bucolic rural scenes but didn’t have to be. The toile prints and patterns were the perfect medium for recording historic events, political messages, and populists’ themes. For example, to highlight France’s scientific advancement, one Huet design, “Le Ballon de Gonesse,” shows Jacques Charles and Nicolas Marie-Noel Robert in a hot air balloon over the Tuileries Gardens. (Read more.)

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