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4. Furniture for Josephine
This jewelry cabinet was intended for the bedchamber of the empress Joséphine ( ) in the Palais des Tuileries. The bronzes conceal locks and mechanisms allowing access to the drawers and secret compartments. The secret mechanisms were changed when the cabinet was given to the empress Marie-Louise ( ) in In 1812, the jewelry case was supplemented by two further pieces from the cabinetmaker François-Honoré-Georges Jacob-Desmalter, which were smaller but in the same style. A cabinet of architectural shape
Designed after a model by the architect Charles Percier ( ), the cabinet has the shape of a building standing on eight vertical legs and suppported by a rectangular base. Above the cornice rises a stylobate. A cassolette for perfumes stands on the base. The legs and cornice are made of kingwood, while the interior of the cabinet, furnished with thirty drawers of the same wood (ten in each part of the body), are neither of kingwood nor yew, but solid mahogony. Lavish gilt bronze decoration
The jewelry case is lavishly decorated with elements in bronze. In the center is a scene depicting the birth of the Queen of the Earth, "to whom Cupids and Goddesses hasten to bear their offerings." Long attributed to Pierre-Philippe Thomire ( ), the bronzes were probably made by the Maison Jacob-Desmalter. The model for the subject in the center was the work of the sculptor Antoine-Denis Chaudet ( ), whose drawings are in the Département des Arts Graphiques of the Louvre. Lastly, on each of the side doors stands a goddess turning toward the central scene. The decoration as a whole foreshadows the ornamental excess of the late nineteenth century.
François-Honoré-Georges JACOB-DESMALTER Serre-bijoux de l'Impératrice dit Grand écrin 1809
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