Small, graceful, streamlined, unadorned and yet very nice and eye-catching, the Pompadour Plat is one of the nineteenth-century fireplace models I love most, not to mention the fact that it has a more than "affordable" price, a price that should be defined by the adjective “ridiculous”... It occurs to me that a fireplace just like this one was owned by Catherine Spaak.... No, it is not that I want to gossip, let alone, I am writing this because a few years ago I saw (if I remember correctly in AD magazine) a beautiful picture of this equally beautiful (and cultured) woman taken in her apartment in Rome sitting in her “office” and in the act of writing having a “Saucer” (this is how we in the trade call the Pompadour plat...) and this image I remember with much, much pleasure. AFTER ALL, OUR UNFORGETTABLE CATHERINE WAS FRENCH AND THE FRENCH, THEY WILL HAVE ALL THE FAULTS THEY HAVE BUT...WHEN IT COMES TO GOOD TASTE, THEY ARE MASTERS…
Given their generally very low price, “Plats” have been produced by the thousands BUT...but with precious marbles like THE HERE PRESENT BRECCIA MEDICEA (among the 4 or 5 finest and most precious marbles in the world) THEY HAVE SHOULD HAVE SHOOT ONE IN...A THOUSAND!!! .
DISMANTLED FROM A PARISIAN “HOTEL PARTICULIER”, BAROQUE STYLE (LOUIS XV), LATE 19TH TO EARLY 20TH CENTURY PERIOD, PERFECT (READ LITERALLY) PRESERVATION AND PERFECT PATINA.
FOR ME, THIS RARE MANTEL IS A GREAT LITTLE BIJOUX.
