France and America




Towards the end of the 18th century the fashion for scenic wallpaper revived in both America and France, leading to some enormous panoramas, like the 1804 20 strip wide panorama, Sauvages de la Mer du Pacifique (Savages of the Pacific), designed by the artist Jean-Gabriel Charvet for the French manufacturer Joseph Dufour et Cie showing the Voyages of Captain Cook. This famous so-called "papier peint" wallpaper is still in situ in Ham House, Peabody, Massachusetts. It was the largest panoramic wallpaper of its time, and marked the burgeoning of a French industry in panoramic wallpapers. Dufour realized almost immediate success from the sale of these papers and enjoyed a lively trade with America. The Neoclassical style currently in favour worked well in houses of the Federal period with Charvet's elegant designs. Like most 18th-century wallpapers, the panorama was designed to be hung above a dado.

Beside Joseph Dufour et Cie (1797 - c. 1830) other French manufacturers of panoramic scenic and trompe l'œil wallpapers, Zuber et Cie (1797–present) and Arthur et Robert exported their product across Europe and North America. Zuber et Cie's c. 1834 design Views of North America hangs in the Diplomatic Reception Room of the White House.

Among the firms begun in France in the 19th century: Desfossé & Karth. In the United States: John Bellrose, Blanchard & Curry, Howell Brothers, Longstreth & Sons, Isaac Pugh in Philadelphia; Bigelow, Hayden & Co. in Massachusetts; Christy & Constant, A. Harwood, R. Prince in New York.

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