E26: French Anteroom of the Empire Period, c. 1810

Narcissa Niblack Thorne, creator of the Thorne Rooms, combined a deep knowledge of design history with a vivid imaginative sensibility. In the 1930s, she assembled a team of skilled artisans in Chicago to construct a series of intricately detailed interiors at the scale of one inch to one foot (1:12).

Conceived as a visual history of interior design, the rooms are at once scholarly and inventive. Meticulously researched and carefully composed, they balance historical accuracy with artistic interpretation. Each atmospheric interior feels like a stage set awaiting its occupants—two parts fantasy, one part history, and entirely absorbing.

Entry from Fannia Weingartner, Miniature Rooms: The Thorne Rooms at the Art Institute of Chicago, 2nd ed. (The Art Institute of Chicago, 2004):

26: French Anteroom of the Empire Period, c. 1810
Napoleon’s taste as emperor gravitated toward a lavish, elaborate, archaeologically correct version of Neoclassicism identified with Imperial Rome, which came to be known as the Empire style. Its chief practitioners in Paris were Charles Percier and Pierre-François-Léonard Fontaine, who had come to Napoleon’s notice when they redecorated the château at Malmaison, in which he and Josephine lived from 1800 to 1803. The two architects not only designed buildings, rooms, furnishings, textiles, and silver, but also staged such events as Napoleon’s coronation and his wedding to his second wife, Marie Louise of Austria.
This room was inspired by the designs of Percier and Fontaine, as well as François-Joseph Bélanger: “I chose this octagonal hall,” Mrs. Thorne declared, “because of the stately severity of its lines, which seem to embody the spirit of imperialism. It lacks [a] livable quality, but it is 100 percent Napoleonic, and that is what I was striving for.” The influence of Imperial Rome is revealed in the treatment of the wall surfaces to suggest marble veneer on a core of brick masonry and in the decoration simulating gilt bronze applied to the marble surface. The ornament is typical of the work of Percier and Fontaine, who often incorporated emblems associated with Napoleon—the Imperial eagle, the bee, the laurel wreath, or the initial N—into their designs for draperies and furnishings.
After Napoleon’s Egyptian campaign, French architects, according to Mrs. Thorne, “indulged in a perfect orgy of Egyptian design,” here represented by the use of the sphinx as a motif in the table, chairs, and fireplace decoration.
Bold colors became fashionable during this period. Typical palettes included gold on black or mahogany red in furniture, gold on crimson damask in upholstery and drapery, and gold on rich brown in rugs, with blue or green often used in place of the red. The curtains and the silk on the chairs in this room are of a green color known in Mrs. Thorne’s time as Empire. The niche is painted in what was called Pompeian red.
The miniature sculpture in the niche, which Mrs. Thorne purchased in Pompeii, depicts Narcissus. The bust of Napoleon on the mantel at one time served as the top of a bell. The rug, both in color and pattern, was copied from a cartoon that was part of a portfolio of designs for rugs that Napoleon commissioned for Fontainebleau.
This room measures 17 1/4 x 29 1/2 x 19 1/2 inches.