Jean-Antoine Alavoine (4 January 1778 – 15 November 1834) was a French architect best known for his column in the

Place de la Bastille The Place de la Bastille () is a square in Paris where the Bastille prison once stood, until the storming of the Bastille and its subsequent physical destruction between 14 July 1789 and 14 July 1790 during the French Revolution. No vestige of ...

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

(1831–1840), the

July Column The July Column () is a monumental column in Paris commemorating the Revolution of 1830. It stands in the center of the Place de la Bastille and celebrates the — the 'three glorious' days of 27–29 July 1830 that saw the fall of Char ...

to memorialize those fallen in the Revolution of 1830. The column, consciously larger-scaled than the column in the

Place Vendôme The Place Vendôme (), earlier known as the Place Louis-le-Grand, and also as the Place Internationale, is a square in the 1st arrondissement of Paris, France, located to the north of the Tuileries Gardens and east of the Église de la Madelein ...

, has a capital freely based on the

Corinthian order The Corinthian order (, ''Korinthiakós rythmós''; ) is the last developed and most ornate of the three principal classical orders of Ancient Greek architecture and Ancient Roman architecture, Roman architecture. The other two are the Doric or ...

, with exaggerated corner volutes flanking putti holding swags, a complicated and somewhat incoherent design that found no imitators. However, in 1813 working with another architect, Bridan, Alavoine had designed to Napoleon's orders, under the direction of

Ambroise Tardieu Ambroise Tardieu (2 March 1788, in Paris – 17 January 1841, in Paris) was a France, French cartography, cartographer and engraving, engraver, and is celebrated for his version of John Arrowsmith (cartographer), John Arrowsmith's 1806 map of ...

, a colossal elephant fountain, the Elephant of the Bastille. This monument was intended for the same Place, to be constructed with a cast-bronze skin over a framework. The statue, in a circular pool, complete with a bronze ''mahout'' on its shoulders, would contain a staircase by means of which visitors could admire the view from its

howdah A howdah or houdah (, derived from the Arabic which means 'bed carried by a camel') also known as hathi howdah ( ), is a carriage which is positioned on the back of an elephant, or occasionally some other animal, such as a camel, used most ...

. The monument was actually erected, but in staff, a moderately weather-resistant plaster, which lasted until 1846 before it was torn down, to great local relief. Alavoine's hothouse for the botanical garden of M. Boursault, at Yerres, near Brunoy, was illustrated in Jean-Charles Krafft, ''Recueil d'architecture civile : contenant les plans, coupes et élévations des châteaux, maisons de campagne, et habitations rurales, jardins anglais, temples, chaumières, kiosques, ponts, etc., situés, aux environs de Paris...'' (Paris 1812) Plate XLVII, as well as a bridge for M. Hypolitte, in the park at Cassan (Plate XLII). In the early stages of the

Gothic Revival Gothic Revival (also referred to as Victorian Gothic or neo-Gothic) is an Architectural style, architectural movement that after a gradual build-up beginning in the second half of the 17th century became a widespread movement in the first half ...

in France, he produced a design for the spire of Rouen Cathedral in 1823, based upon the spire of

Salisbury Cathedral Salisbury Cathedral, formally the Cathedral Church of the Blessed Virgin Mary, is an Church of England, Anglican cathedral in the city of Salisbury, England. The cathedral is regarded as one of the leading examples of Early English architecture, ...

(Glaser).

References

External links

Alavoine's 1813 watercolor design for the elephant monument, Place de la Bastille.
Watercolor of the elephant project
Louvre, inv. no. 23521

, by David d'Angers, 1833. Inscribed "Alavoine architecte". {{DEFAULTSORT:Alavoine, Jean-Antoine 1778 births 1834 deaths 19th-century French architects

References

Further reading

External links