Discusses the creation and contents of many interiors of great French houses of the 18th century. Using contemporary inventories, letters and journals it brings to life the tastes and preoccupations of their creators, both in their public lives and more private moments.

Architectural Space in Eighteenth-Century Europe: Constructing Identities and Interiors explores how a diverse, pan-European group of eighteenth-century patrons - among them bankers, bishops, bluestockings, and courtesans - used architectural space and décor to shape and express identity. Eighteenth-century European architects understood the client's instrumental role in giving form and meaning to architectural space. In a treatise published in 1745, the French architect Germain Boffrand determined that a visitor could "judge the character of the master for whom the house was built by the way in which it is planned, decorated and distributed." This interdisciplinary volume addresses two key interests of contemporary historians working in a range of disciplines: one, the broad question of identity formation, most notably as it relates to ideas of gender, class, and ethnicity; and two, the role played by different spatial environments in the production - not merely the reflection - of identity at defining historical and cultural moments. By combining contemporary critical analysis with a historically specific approach, the book's contributors situate ideas of space and the self within the visual and material remains of interiors in eighteenth-century Europe. In doing so, they offer compelling new insight not only into this historical period, but also into our own.

"The Art Through the Century series introduces readers to important visual vocabulary of Western art."--Back cover.

This is an in-depth study of the intellectual, technical, and artistic encounters between Europe and China in the late eighteenth century, focusing on the purposeful acquisition of information and images that characterized a direct engagement with the idea of "China." The central figure in this story is Henri-Léonard Bertin (1720–1792), who served as a minister of state under Louis XV and, briefly, Louis XVI. Both his official position and personal passion for all things Chinese placed him at the center of intersecting networks of like-minded individuals who shared his ideal vision of China as a nation from which France had much to learn. John Finlay examines a fascinating episode in the rich history of cross-cultural exchange between China and Europe in the early modern period, and this book will be an important and timely contribution to a very current discussion about Sino-French cultural relations. This book will be of interest to scholars in art history, visual culture, European and Chinese history.

French-Indigenous families were a central force in shaping Detroit’s history. Detroit’s Hidden Channels: The Power of French-Indigenous Families in the Eighteenth Century examines the role of these kinship networks in Detroit’s development as a site of singular political and economic importance in the continental interior. Situated where Anishinaabe, Wendat, Myaamia, and later French communities were established and where the system of waterways linking the Atlantic Ocean to the Gulf of Mexico narrowed, Detroit’s location was its primary attribute. While the French state viewed Detroit as a decaying site of illegal activities, the influence of the French-Indigenous networks grew as members diverted imperial resources to bolster an alternative configuration of power relations that crossed Indigenous and Euro-American nations. Women furthered commerce by navigating a multitude of gender norms of their nations, allowing them to defy the state that sought to control them by holding them to European ideals of womanhood. By the mid-eighteenth century, French-Indigenous families had become so powerful, incoming British traders and imperial officials courted their favor. These families would maintain that power as the British imperial presence splintered on the eve of the American Revolution.

The first book on the work of a designer whose refined classical interiors are widely desired and emulated as the epitome of French style. Honored as one of the top designers by all the international design magazines and universally admired by design editors, Jean-Louis Deniot is in demand. His updated classical approach now graces interiors in Paris, the French countryside, Moscow, India, New York, Chicago, L.A., and beyond—and his legacy is already being compared to that of design greats such as Jacques Grange and Alberto Pinto. Deniot is an architect first, ensuring that the interior architecture of his rooms is harmonious before giving a neoclassical approach to the decor. He brings education, logic, and design history to his work, with one eye looking at the most refined style of French eighteenth century and one eye on the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. His mix is highly individual and includes contemporary art and custom-made furniture, yet his rooms always look comfortable and are never overly formal or trendy. This book demonstrates a new, sophisticated classical style that is changing the scene for international design and offering inspiration and ideas to decorators, homeowners, and antiques enthusiasts.