The Gobelins Manufactory () is a historic

tapestry Tapestry is a form of textile art, traditionally woven by hand on a loom. Tapestry is weft-faced weaving, in which all the warp threads are hidden in the completed work, unlike most woven textiles, where both the warp and the weft threads ma ...

factory in Paris, France. It is located at 42 avenue des Gobelins, near Les Gobelins métro station in the 13th arrondissement of Paris. It was originally established on the site as a medieval dyeing business by the family

Gobelin Gobelin was the name of a family of dyers, who in all probability came originally from Reims, France, and who in the middle of the 15th century established themselves in the Faubourg Saint Marcel, Paris, on the banks of the Bièvre. The first ...

La Bataille de Zama Jules Romain 1688 1690

Overview

It is best known as a royal factory supplying the court of the French monarchs since

Louis XIV Louis XIV (Louis Dieudonné; 5 September 16381 September 1715), also known as Louis the Great () or the Sun King (), was List of French monarchs, King of France from 14 May 1643 until his death in 1715. His reign of 72 years and 110 days is the Li ...

, and it is now run by the ''Administration générale du Mobilier national et des Manufactures nationales de tapis et tapisseries'' of the French Ministry of Culture. The factory is open for guided tours several afternoons per week by appointment, as well as for casual visits every day except Mondays and some specific holidays. The Galerie des Gobelins is dedicated to temporary exhibitions of tapestries from the French manufactures and furnitures from the Mobilier National, built in the gardens by

Auguste Perret Auguste Perret (12 February 1874 – 25 February 1954) was a French architect and a pioneer of the architectural use of reinforced concrete. His major works include the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées, the first Art Deco building in Paris; the ...

in 1937.

History

The

s were a family of

dye A dye is a colored substance that chemically bonds to the substrate to which it is being applied. This distinguishes dyes from pigments which do not chemically bind to the material they color. Dye is generally applied in an aqueous solution and ...

rs who, in the middle of the 15th century, established themselves in the ,

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. Si ...

, on the banks of the Bièvre.

Comans-La Planche workshop

In 1602,

Henry IV of France Henry IV (french: Henri IV; 13 December 1553 – 14 May 1610), also known by the epithets Good King Henry or Henry the Great, was King of Navarre (as Henry III) from 1572 and King of France from 1589 to 1610. He was the first monar ...

rented factory space from the Gobelins for his

Flemish Flemish (''Vlaams'') is a Low Franconian dialect cluster of the Dutch language. It is sometimes referred to as Flemish Dutch (), Belgian Dutch ( ), or Southern Dutch (). Flemish is native to Flanders, a historical region in northern Belgium; ...

tapestry makers, Marc de Comans and François de la Planche, on the current location of the Gobelins Manufactory adjoining the Bièvre river. In 1629, their sons Charles de Comans and Raphaël de la Planche took over their fathers' tapestry workshops, and in 1633, Charles was the head of the Gobelins manufactory. Their partnership ended around 1650, and the workshops were split into two. Tapestries from this early, Flemish period are sometimes called ''pre-gobelins''.

Colbert and Le Brun

Apse of the chapel of the Manufacture des Gobelins

In 1662, the works in the Faubourg Saint Marcel, with the adjoining grounds, were purchased by Jean-Baptiste Colbert on behalf of

and made into a general upholstery factory, in which designs both in tapestry and in all kinds of furniture were executed under the superintendence of the

court painter A court painter was an artist who painted for the members of a royal or princely family, sometimes on a fixed salary and on an exclusive basis where the artist was not supposed to undertake other work. Painters were the most common, but the cour ...

, Charles Le Brun, who served as director and chief designer from 1663–1690. On account of Louis XIV's financial problems, the establishment was closed in 1694, but reopened in 1697 for the manufacture of tapestry, chiefly for royal use. It rivalled the Beauvais tapestry works until the

French Revolution The French Revolution ( ) was a period of radical political and societal change in France that began with the Estates General of 1789 and ended with the formation of the French Consulate in November 1799. Many of its ideas are conside ...

, when work at the factory was suspended. The factory was revived during the

Bourbon Restoration Bourbon Restoration may refer to: France under the House of Bourbon: * Bourbon Restoration in France (1814, after the French revolution and Napoleonic era, until 1830; interrupted by the Hundred Days in 1815) Spain under the Spanish Bourbons: * Ab ...

and, in 1826, the manufacture of carpets was added to that of tapestry. In 1871, the building was partly burned down during the

Paris Commune The Paris Commune (french: Commune de Paris, ) was a revolutionary government that seized power in Paris, the capital of France, from 18 March to 28 May 1871. During the Franco-Prussian War of 1870–71, the French National Guard had defende ...

. The factory is still in operation today as a state-run institution.

Historical site

Today, the manufactory consists of a set of four irregular buildings dating to the seventeenth century, plus the building on the avenue des Gobelins built by Jean-Camille Formigé in 1912 after the 1871 fire. They contain Le Brun's residence and workshops that served as foundries for most of the bronze statues in the park of Versailles, as well as looms on which tapestries are woven following seventeenth century techniques. The Gobelins still produces some limited amount of tapestries for the decoration of French governmental institutions, with contemporary subjects.

Fulham connection

A branch of the manufactory was established in

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

probably in the early 18th-century in the area that is now

Fulham High Street Fulham High Street is a street in Fulham, London. It runs north–south, from the junction with the western end of Fulham Road in the north, where it continues to Hammersmith as Fulham Palace Road, past the junction with the western end of ...

. Around 1753 it appears to have been taken over by the priest and adventurer, Pierre Parisot, but closed only a few years later.

Gallery

File:Death of Constantine (tapestry) - 1623-1625.jpg, ''Death of Constantine'' tapestry (one in a series) after a design by Rubens woven by Filippe Maëcht and Hans Taye in the Comans-La Planche workshop, 1623–1625. Image:Gobelins - Chancellerie (Musée Nissim de Camondo).JPG, Gobelins tapestry, circa 1680, in the Musée Nissim de Camondo, Paris. File:La sortie de l Ambassadeur Turc du Jardin des Tuileries Gobelins 1734 1737.jpg, ''La sortie de l'Ambassadeur Turc du Jardin des Tuileries'' (

Ottoman Empire The Ottoman Empire, * ; is an archaic version. The definite article forms and were synonymous * and el, Оθωμανική Αυτοκρατορία, Othōmanikē Avtokratoria, label=none * info page on book at Martin Luther University ...

embassy of Mehemet Effendi), Atelier Lefebvre et Mommerqué, Gobelins, 1734–1737. Image:Louis14-H.jpg,

visits the Gobelins with Colbert, 15 October 1667. Tapestry from the series "Histoire du roi" designed by Charles Le Brun and woven between 1667 and 1672. Image:Gobelin Manufactory - Portrait of Louis XVI (1745-93) - Walters 8227.jpg, Portrait of Louis XVI (1745–93). Tapestry produced by Gobelins Manufactory. File:Panthéon Tapisserie de la manufacture des Gobelins.JPG, Tapestry in the Panthéon, Paris. Image:Loom haute lisse DSC08774.jpg, A "high-warp" (''haute lisse'') loom. Image:Loom basse lisse DSC08828.jpg, A "low-warp" (''basse lisse'') loom, used for smaller pieces.

References

* Wolf Burchard, The Sovereign Artist: Charles Le Brun and the Image of Louis XIV, London 2016 * Lacordaire, ''Notice historique sur les Manufactures impériales de tapisseries des Gobelins et de tapis de la Savonnerie, précédée du catalogue des tapisseries qui y sont exposées'' (Paris, 1853) * Genspach, ''Répertoire détaillé des tapisseries exécutées aux Gobelins'', 1662–1892 (Paris, 1893) *

Jules Guiffrey Jules-Joseph Guiffrey (29 November 1840 – 26 November 1918) was a 19th-century French art historian, a member of the Académie des beaux-arts. Career While studying law (he was graduated in 1861Sophie Mouquin, �Jules Guiffrey », ''Dictionnai ...

, ''Histoire de la tapisserie en France'' (Paris, 1878–1885).

External links

Manufacture des Gobelins
(in French) * Gobelins tapestries in th
Collections of the Mobilier national
(France)
Museums of Paris entry

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