The console: history and features

The console is a high-legged piece of furniture designed as a half-table set against a wall. Its original four legs are often limited to two, and it is sometimes transformed into a single leg supporting an opulent décor. The console table is more a decorative piece of furniture than a utilitarian one. Placed along walls or in the corners of rooms, consoles are designed to support art objects and sculptures.

The console during the Regency period

Very common in interiors from the 17th century onwards, the console table has a wide carved, highly ornamented and sometimes openworked belt. It is made of oak or beech wood, waxed, painted or gilded. During the Regency period, the brackets are generally inscribed in the panelling. Carved decoration became abundant, preceding the excesses of the early Louis XV style. The S-shaped base is very ornamental. The two or four legs have the top in the shape of bearded masks. The spacer is very elaborate, with a large decorative motif in the centre.

Louis XV consoles

The "console table", as it was called under Louis XV, was mainly a decorative piece of furniture that was placed in the entrance of apartments or between two windows and lent itself admirably to the fantasies of the Rocaille style. The table top in Marble is supported by two scrolled legs and leans against the wall.

Decorated with jagged foliage, the brackets are made of natural oak or, more often, covered with gilding. The consoles can also be painted like the woodwork or "au naturel", i.e. the roses are pink, the leaves green and the daisies white. The sinuous legs are richly carved with shells, acanthus leaves, scrolls and a wealth of openwork plant motifs. The outer edge of the top of Marble was first carved in the shape of a "bec de corbin", then with a double groove, before the right-angle cut that became common during the Empire.

Louis XVI console tables

The Louis XVI consoles are very different from the Louis XV consoles. The curved legs are replaced by straight legs, fluted or not, linked together by a curved crotch supporting an antique urn or a vase with rectangular handles.

The tray of Marble is rectangular or half-moon shaped and hugs the belt decorated with interlacing rosettes or fluting. Garlands of roses and carved and draped bows adorn the entablature.

Directoire and Empire brackets

Under the Directoire period, the rectangular brackets abandoned their half-moon shape. Both materials and ornamentation are very simple. Tables feature a marble top supported by sheathed legs, sometimes adorned with caryatids, chimeras, swans, griffins and sphinxes, which became de rigueur under the Empire.

The Empire console table, massive and solemn, is often rectangular, sometimes half-moon shaped. The top of Marble is supported by a wide mahogany band decorated with bronzes representing antique effigies, swans and allegorical figures. The four legs rest on a thick wooden base that replaces the crotch of earlier periods. The front legs can be either sphinxes or sheathed caryatids, or simply decorated with bronzes. They often end in claws. The back - placed between the back legs, which are always very simple - is often decorated with a mirror.

The Charles X console

Under the Restoration, the narrow, rectangular brackets with softened angles retain the Empire structure, while becoming more flexible. The dark marble top is cut straight, but the sharp angles are softened by appropriate grinding. It rests on a wide band, decorated with an inlaid motif, resting on two curved brackets that sometimes join the straight back legs. A thick, slightly recessed base connects the legs. A mirror may be placed between the rear legs.

Restoration console in cherry wood

Napoleon III consoles

The Napoleon III period saw a clear predilection for small tables, consoles and pedestal tables. The most interesting consoles are heavy pieces of furniture, with long rectangular tops resting on caryatids. Some are finished entirely in gilded bronze, others in painted cast iron.

The consoles illustrate Napoleon III's taste for pastiche styles, a taste enthusiastically followed by the bourgeoisie. Brackets, neo-Louis XV, neo-Louis XVI and Empire-style consoles are all produced here.