RENÈ LALIQUE. France, ca. 1950.
Clairefontaine" perfume box.
Moulded glass.
Work reproduced in "Le Catalogue Raisonné del L'Ouvre en Verre de R. Lalique", by Felix Marcilhac, Les Editions de l'Amateur, section perfume bottles, p. 338, no. 526, with photo.
Signed in burin on the reverse of the Lalique base and with label.
Provenance: Spanish private collection, formed between 1970 and 1995.
Measurements: 12 x 9,5 x 5,5 cm .
Clairefontaine" perfume box designed by Renè Lalique in 1931, in translucent moulded glass. Satin-finish glass stopper decorated with 4 sprigs of lily of the valley. This model is a reference to the Clairefontaine garden, located in the south-west of Paris (France), which was one of René Lalique's main sources of inspiration.
The firm Lalique was originally founded by René Jules Lalique (1860 - 1945), one of the foremost glassmakers of the time, and one of the first to sculpt glass for large monumental works such as the fountains on the Champs Elysées. He enjoyed great renown thanks to his original creations of jewellery, perfume bottles, glasses, plates, etc., in the Art Nouveau and Art Deco styles. He trained with the Parisian jeweller Louis Aucoq, and then continued his studies at Sudenham Art College in London. The excellence of his creations and the taste he applied to his work earned him important commissions for the interior decoration of ships, trains such as the Orient Express, churches such as Saint-Nicasius in Reims, and numerous religious and civil goldsmiths' works. Lalique was not content with simply designing his models, but also founded a factory to produce them in large quantities, patenting several innovative glass manufacturing processes, and various technical effects such as "Lalique satin" or opalescent glass. Pieces by Lalique are preserved in prominent museums such as the Corning Museum of Glass and the Metropolitan Museum of Glass in New York, the Louvre and the Orsay Museum in Paris, among many others.