Vernis Martin

Vernis Martin boiserie, in the boudoir of the Dauphine, Marie-Josèphe de Saxe, Versailles

Pleyel Piano made in 1903 in Louis XV style Vernis Martin case with Watteauesque scenes

In French interior design, vernis Martin is a type (or a number of types) of Japanning or imitation lacquer named after the French Martin brothers: Guillaume, Etienne-Simon, Robert and Julien. They ran a leading factory from between about 1730 and 1770, and were vernisseurs du roi. But they did not invent the process, nor were they the only producers, nor does the term cover a single formula or technique.^[1] It imitated Chinese lacquer and European subjects and was applied to a wide variety of items, from furniture to coaches. It is said to have been made by heating oil and copal and then adding Venetian turpentine.

References

• Frederic Jones, The Concise Dictionary of Interior Design, ISBN 1-56052-067-1
• Osborne, Harold (ed), The Oxford Companion to the Decorative Arts, 1975, OUP, ISBN 0198661134
• Marianne Webb, Lacquer : Technology and Conservation: Technology and Conservation, ISBN 0-7506-4412-5
• David Garrioch, The Making of Revolutionary Paris, ISBN 0-520-24327-7
•  Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Vernis Martin". Encyclopædia Britannica. 27 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. 

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Vernis Martin.

• Vernis Martin Lacquers
• Images of a Pleyel piano with Vernis Martin Cabinet