INTRODUCTION: Why have I located this fireplace, at the bottom of "simple" design, in both its "proper" section (i.e., the Louis XV category) and the High Range category?
Well, for several reasons:
(a) First, a Louis XV Trois Coquilles mantel in Black Belgium marble is as rare as a white fly, and that would already be enough;
b) another and very important reason is .... “technical.” In fact, almost all Belgian Black marble fireplaces have some structural problem ... said marble, while wonderful in color and a harbinger of magical atmospheres, is terribly “delicate” and is affected by any settling of the building in which it is placed ... it would be better to say “affected,” since today the structural quality has definitely improved, but you have to take into account that this specific fireplace was placed on nineteenth-century wood-beam floors, and perhaps in buildings of great weight, given the thickness of the walls of the time, and so it happened that, at the slightest settling, even at the most imperceptible movement, a slab of its marble would whisper . . “tac!!!”, thus cracking ... and when you then go to disassemble it, instead of one piece, in your hand you find two or three and ... on those very delicate surfaces it is impossible to make a visually satisfactory restoration. Here, this fireplace is completely intact, which is why it has the right to enter, head and shoulders above the rest, the ranks of its “High Range” siblings.
SOMEWHAT...PECULIAR COMMENT.
“Buying a Black fireplace is, after all, a stroke of life,” I always say to customers (but it would be more correct to say ‘to my customers,’ when, in fact, does a male ever have a say in the choice of a fireplace? the male of the human race when in the company of his female loses all connotations of virility, that he shows it off on special and limited occasions:
1) When he is in bars with friends, there he becomes a lion, puffing himself up and strutting about with who knows what manly feats...
2) When he is near other (and usually younger) female, then he takes on the appearance (more like..attempts to take on the appearance..) of “the man who never has to ask...”
3) In the workplace...to his co-workers he says “I'm in charge at my house...” but he doesn't say this to everyone, only to those who his house never visits...).
Whatever, what were we saying? ah, “owning a fireplace like this is a stroke of life,” I say to clients who would like to buy a fireplace in Belgian Black but are a little restrained from doing so fearing that the “black” is too black..
To husbands, however, whom I see despairing over its cost, I say another magic little phrase “It's an investment, everyone is looking for it a fireplace made of Black marble from Belgium, 5 years ago it cost half, and in 5 years it will cost twice as much...” so I refresh them a little..
To you women here I say that such a fireplace has personality to spare and that your friends will envy you for centuries to come, both for the intrinsic beauty of this artifact and for the courage you have shown in making it king and master of your living room, courage that they have lacked..
In any case, should you ever desire the most “fashionable” fireplace anywhere on the globe, hurry, I have a few examples right now, but I often go without for several months.
PROVENANCE PARIS, PURE PARISIAN STYLISM, BELGIAN SCULPTURE, SECOND HALF OF THE 19TH CENTURY PERIOD, OPTIMAL CONSERVATION.
