A combined effort of the Centre de Recherches Historiques sur les Maîtres Ébénistes and the Low Countries Sculpture Society, whose libraries and archives have merged and are housed in the Hôtel de la Roche (1750) at Mons, the Annual Seminar will have its inaugural edition in July 2025.

The first edition wishes to address questions about the production, consumption, collecting and display of “carpentry furniture” (in the Parisian sense of the expression) across Europe and North America, from the gothic period to Art Nouveau. Issues of design history, collaborations between creators and producers, artists and artisans, as well as the relations with any other people involved are sought. Specificities of “carpentry furniture”, as opposed to other types of furniture design and production, may be investigated. This includes the study of relations between carpenters and sculptors, as well as that of historic sources, such as those published by André Jacob Roubo (1739-91).

Its theme will draw, amongst others, but not exclusively, on the rich tradition of carpentry in the Low Countries, often in combination with magnificent sculpture in solid oak, particularly for church furniture, and on the Parisian tradition for “meubles de menuiserie” (“carpentry furniture”), as differentiated from “meubles d’ébénisterie” (“veneered furniture”) from the the 17th century onwards, as formalised with separate guilds. “Carpentry furniture” included seat furniture, console tables, floors and wall pannelling often with ornate sculptural elements, and always in solid wood, frequently painted and/or gilt, as opposed to veneered furniture. Gilt console tables were a particularly respected product of the Paris “menuisiers”.

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