If you’ve ever wanted to drape yourself in toile, you’ve come to the right place. For our June OOTM, we offer a rare quantity—over 19 yards—of a neoclassical toile de Jouy printed over 200 years ago.
The pattern is known as “Pallas and Venus” for the two goddesses depicted in the main cartouches, which are flanked by Eros and his attributes, dancing female figures carrying bows surmounted by hunting dogs and horns (perhaps references to Artemis), and a network olive branches, oak leaves, wheat sheaves, grapes, and caducei. “Pallas and Venus” was designed by painter Jean-Baptiste Huet around 1806 and printed using a copper roller at the Manufacture Oberkampf in Jouy-en-Josas. Oberkampfproduced the pattern in multiple colors, including this version in sepia.
Huet began working with Oberkampf in 1790 and continued until his death in 1811. The painter’s compositions for Oberkampf, from pastoral scenes to high neoclassicism like this one, proved immensely popular for bed hangings, and these joined lengths indeed once formed most of a bed set.
Oberkampf’s success through the Ancien Regime continued under Napoleon. The manufactory was awarded with a gold medal at the industrial exposition in 1806, the same year that Napoleon presented Christophe-Philippe Oberkampf with the Légion d’honneur.
Sold by the yard (36 x 35 in.) in lengths up to 228 in. long.
