Rene Lalique Car Mascots at Le Mans! Who would have thought the sentimental home of European auto racing (and a very sentimental place to the great Texas racer Carroll Shelby) would have a handful of Lalique Mascots on display at the local car museum?
Here is a 5 minute video with a 10 second glimpse at a half dozen hood ornaments designed by Rene Lalique amongst the vintage race (and other) cars.
You can learn more about the Sarthe Auto Museum by checking out the museum website. And the really inquisitive types can learn a lot more about Carroll Shelby at wikipedia! Also, if you are interested in seeing where else in the world the works of Rene Lalique can be found in museums, check out our list of Lalique Museum Collections with links to each museum.
Finally, if you know of any local or other museums that have RLalique items in their collections that are not listed on the Museum page, please let us know and we’ll ad them to the list.
This Rene Lalique Video was set to great music, and is comprised of a series of still shots of a large number of pieces, many unique! The creator moved the camera around and zoomed in and out to create the feeling of movement. Overall, for both the objects and the music, it’s worth the relaxing 4 minutes play time for admirers of the works of the great Rene Lalique!
The October 16th issue of the “Antiques & Auction News”, the antiques publication that bills itself as “The Most Widely Read Collector’s Newspaper in the East!” has an extensive article covering the highlights of what collectors should be aware of in the area of fake Lalique and other dodgy items passed off as RLalique. The article, titled “Fooled By Fakes: Buyer Beware! Rene Lalique Art Glass by Anita Stratos”, also includes a discussion on color changed radiated pieces, as well as advice on how to protect yourself by being well informed.
The main reference material for the article was the information found here at RLalique.com in our section on Fake Lalique items, as well as in phone conversations between the author and an expert here at RLalique.com World Headquarters! Seriously, when you want to talk Ghosts; who you gonna call? You call Ghostbusters! When you want to talk RLalique ……….
We’ve posted the article in its entirety with the generous and kind permission of the author Anita Stratos, in our Rene Lalique Articles of Interest Section! In addition to this article, you’ll also find several other articles of interest in that section, including articles covering bid rigging at auctions and other illegal bid schemes, which were written by a lawyer knowledgeable in auction law.
We noted for the fakes article, that the incidence of fake Lalique items is much less than in many other fields, but as you can see from our Fake Lalique Section, and also the RLalique Police Page, there are landmines out there to be avoided.
Great news to have coverage of information from our site by a large and respected antiques publication. And also to have wider coverage of the kind of information that collectors should have to protect themselves against a mistaken purchase. One of the worst things for a collecting community is to have anyone, especially novice collectors or beginning collectors buy a fake or other problematic piece.
It’s in the interest of all R Lalique collectors to have widely available information in this area, and to have a large overall knowledge base of public information that purchasers can access to get educated. This article is another step in the right direction of increasing public awareness and education. Check it out.
By the way, every item model pictured in this blog post has been represented or offered for sale as R Lalique. None are.
Rene Lalique Jewelry: In the top tier of Lalique’s jewelry creations, made before his turn to mass production of glass, are the Rene Lalique unique Serpents motif objects. Two great variations of this striking R Lalique Jewelry design are in world-class museums and their survival provides a great chance to compare and contrast follow-on implementations by Lalique of one of his most amazing design ideas.
The piece most often appearing in exhibitions and photos around the world (including the accompanying photo from Wikipedia Commons) is the 9 Serpents pectoral* owned by the Gulbenkian Museum in Lisbon. This amazing piece was acquired by Calouste Gulbenkian directly from Rene Lalique in 1908 and it resides in the museum specifically built to house the collections he amassed during his lifetime, including his collection of over 100 of the works of Rene Lalique. The Gulbenkian Serpents creation is classified as a pectoral instead of a brooch due to its amazing size of 21 cm, or over 8 inches long. A similar piece to the Gulbenkian’s was exhibited in 1900 with strings of pearls hanging from the mouths of the serpents.
But another great Serpents motif jewelry piece also appears at exhibition from time to time, this one owned by the State Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg Russia. The Hermitage is housed in the former Winter Palace of the Czars, and contains over three million art objects in its collections including several works of Rene Lalique. The Hermitage Serpents design takes the form of a pendant, and features 6 Serpents, two of which retain the natural pearl in their mouths, so often used by Lalique in his jewelry. This pendant form Serpents design is roughly half the size of the Gulbenkian’s Serpents pectoral, measuring only 11 cm long. It recently was on loan to the Artistic Luxury Exhibition which appeared both in Cleveland and San Francisco and which ended in May.
Lalique would often make variations of his great jewelry designs, using and re-using similar implementations of the same motif to create unique objects. In this example, Lalique created objects with different uses and size, but both retain the look and feel so to speak, of the original artistic creation. A study of these two great objects shows not just the influence of Art Nouveau on Lalique’s jewelry, but also how the same basic design was adapted by Lalique to different purposes, not just of use, but also of effect.
Here are two short videos, one taken at the Gulbenkian showing some of the works of Lalique on exhibit there, and another taken at an exhibition of some of the Art Nouveau masterpieces of the Hermitage. Both videos show the Lalique Serpents Jewelry owned by the respective museum.
The Bible of Lalique’s Jewelry, Rene Lalique Schmuck und Objects d’art 1890-1910 by Sigrid Barten shows several variations of this great Serpents design. It’s of course available in our Rene Lalique Books and Library Section on modern books about Rene Lalique and his R Lalique works. In this Library section and others, you will also find various books and catalogues on Lalique’s jewelry, the hardback edition of the great Artistic Luxury Exhibition book, as well as several different publications documenting the Gulbenkian’s RLalique collection.
*Pectoral really means breast-plate, and is used to describe what in effect is a really big brooch. Think brooch on steroids!
The short version is, they were shipped by boat:), but as usual the whole story is a bit more complicated! We’ll try and keep it brief as usual.
In 1852, Meiji the Great, destined to be the 122nd Emperor of Japan was born with the name Mutsuhito. His birth was less than a year before Admiral Perry would arrive on the scene. In 1867 at the age of 14, he became Emperor of Japan. He had no children with his wife, but had 15 kids with 5 different official consorts. Only five of his children survived childhood. The one of the five we are interested in is Princess Nobuko, the eighth daughter of the Emperor. In 1910 she married the royal Prince Yasuhiko, also an eighth child, who four years earlier had established the Imperial Family of Asaka!
In the early 1920’s, the Prince headed off to Paris for military studies. There he was seriously injured in a car accident in 1923. His wife came to Paris to help nurse him back to health, and they both were still in Paris in 1925 when the 1925 Exposition Internationale Des Arts Decoratifs took the world by storm. Apparently, it took the Asaka family by storm as well, and the new art deco style, decoratif art in everyday life, caught their fancy.
In 1929, they began work on an Art Deco residence in Tokyo that was completed in 1933. While the Ministry of Imperial Household oversaw the design and construction, the input of several of the great French decorative arts practitioners, notably Rene Lalique, and to a larger degree Henri Rapin (to whom the Prince entrusted the interior design of 7 of the rooms), made the house a model of modernist art deco restraint and style. The architectural contributions of Rene Lalique included the glass panel doors, and the chandeliers in the dining hall and grand guest room.
Fast forward through a war, the Asaka Family in 1947 lost it’s membership in the Imperial Household, the residence was taken over by the government and put to various government uses, and finally, it was turned over to the Tokyo Metropolitan Foundation For History and Culture, which opened the doors of the Asaka residence as the Tokyo Metropolitan Teien Art Museum in 1983. The Asaka residence had wonderful grounds surrounding it, hence the addition of the word “Teien”, meaning park or gardens, to the name of the museum.
And that is why the great doors and chandeliers of Rene Lalique still exist in their original home today, along with other decorative R Lalique objects, all preserved in the museum.
Over the years, the museum has held many exhibitions, including a great Rene Lalique exhibition in 1988 that is documented extensively in the catalogue book of the exhibition containing about 200 very high quality R Lalique photos. A copy of this rare catalogue book from the exhibition at the former Asaka residence is available in the Rene Lalique Books and Library Section.
What happened to Prince Asaka, the creator of the great art deco residence? He served in the military during World War II (not without some controversy), making the rank of General. After the war he moved to the small city of Atami south of Tokyo where he became an avid golfer. He lived to the age of 93, passing away in 1981!
And why are we telling you all this now? Well, it’s great R Lalique history, and more importantly, we stumbled across a great video of the museum, which takes you thru a personal video tour, including looks at some of the works of Rene Lalique which are installed and housed at the former Asaka residence. An in situ look at period works of the great Rene Lalique at the Tokyo Metropolitan Teien Art Museum.
Lalique trophy is presented to the “Best In Show” at the Concours d’Elegance at Pebble Beach!
For at least 10 years, the Best in Show award at the amazing Concours d’Elegance has been a Lalique Trophy, presented by the Elegant Set, a quiet Carmel, California store associated with noted Lalique personality Nicholas Dawes. The actual trophy is a Lalique Crystal “Trophee” figure mounted on a custom base. Crystal Lalique Paperweights Chrysis and Tete De Aigle are also presented as class prizes. Of course, with the Rene Lalique Hood Ornaments gracing the front ends of so many of the finest motor cars of yesteryear in attendance, it’s only fitting that Lalique is in the forefront when awards are presented.
The Elegant Set has perhaps the largest inventory of Rene Lalique items in stock and on display of any gallery in the United States. It has been established for 25 years, and is a center of R Lalique activity during the Concours. A quick review of their current inventory reveals 24 different R Lalique Car Mascot models including for example a rare R Lalique Pintade Hood Ornament, and a host of other items ranging in price from a few hundred dollars to tens of thousands.
The day before the Concours, on Saturday the 15th, the Elegant Set hosts an R Lalique event, the most important feature of which is champagne and hors d’oeuvres from noon on! But it’s also a chance to see a good amount of R Lalique items in one place, and to meet and talk to Nick Dawes, who fields questions from all comers about R Lalique for most of the day Saturday, in between sips of champagne of course!
The Elegant Set is a private enterprise, but their involvement with the Concours and the exposure they provide for the works of the great Rene Lalique during this important motoring event spreads benefits far beyond Carmel that touch many R Lalique collectors worldwide. And The Elegant Set is so discreet they don’t even have a real address! Heck, they’re so discreet we don’t even have photos to go along with this post! So if this is the first you’ve heard of them, now you know why! But if you want to stop by, they are located at the corner of 7th and San Carlos in Carmel. And you can reach the Elegant Set’s Ken Derrick, also known in certain circles as “The Lalique Trophy Presenter”, at 800 497 4994 for further information.
If you call, the big question you might ask Ken our behalf is this: Why are they waiting until noon to start the champagne flowing?
Lalique Hood Ornaments -Lalique Car Mascots in Hickory Corners: How did that happen?
In July 1966, the Gilmore Car Museum in Hickory Corners Michigan opened to the public. It was the love affair of Michiganders (that’s right, they’re called Michiganders*) Don Gilmore and his wife Genevieve. Where is Hickory Corners you might ask? Well, it’s kind of midway between the Michigan Cities of Battle Creek (think cereal – cold breakfast cereal was invented here by Dr. John Harvey Kellog and it is still the headquarters of the company founded by his brother that bears his name, and Post Cereals is headquartered there as well), Lansing (Michigan State University and the childhood and football home of President Gerald Ford, who played on two Michigan State National Championship Football teams, before the big war of course), Grand Rapids (Autos and Furniture: Austin Automobile Company started there in 1901 and lasted near 20 years), and Kalamazoo (Gibson Guitars was founded here, as was the pharmaceutical giant Upjohn, and it’s still home to Checker Motors Company, who used to make the Checker Cab!).
Basically the former heartland of the industrial Midwest during the salad days of U.S. manufacturing! A lot of money was made here and stayed here in the form of public projects by wealthy people and companies. The Gilmores established a foundation that owns the museum and carries on, despite the passing of both Gilmores several decades ago.
So, what does the Gilmore Car Museum have? Where to begin, hmmm. Let’s start with the Blue Moon Diner, a real 1941 diner, picked up in toto from Meridian Connecticut, and moved here to the Michigan countryside! And yes, they serve pecan pie and frozen custard. Over 200 autos, from a 1948 “Waltz Blue” Tucker (number 47 out of a total production of only 51), to a Dusenberg! There’s a re-created 1930’s Shell gas station (including memorabilia from a Shell station just 3 miles from the Gilmore that closed during WWII), a small town train station, nine antique Michigan barns, and three miles of paved roads, as well as a huge collection of vintage pedal cars and miniatures. You may see their authentic London Double Decker bus tooling around the property when you visit, and it’s rumored (though not advertised) that a ride in a cool old vehicle might be had from time to time!
The museum is important in many other respects. For example, The Pierce-Arrow Society (the Roadshow video linked below features a Pierce-Arrow with the Rene Lalique Car Mascot Archers) established its museum at The Gilmore. As a result there are a wide array of Pierce-Arrows on display, one of the coolest of which is a 1912 motorcycle. Note that the entire museum grew out of a gift from Mrs. to Mr. Gilmore of a Pierce-Arrow project car needing renovation. Also, the Tucker Historical Collection and Library, a project of the Tucker Automobile Club of America (the “Car of the Future”) is at the Gilmore. Heck, they even have a Chrysler Turbine Car!
Why do we R.Lalique types care about all this? Well, because they also have one of the largest hood ornament/car mascot/auto badge collections in the United States. It contains over 1600 items, some of which are Rene Lalique Car Mascots!
And why are we writing about this now? Well, because in August 2008, the U.S. Antiques Roadshow was in Grand Rapids and made a little trip down memory lane to Hickory Corners for a short Video Special at the Gilmore. In the video, Eric Silver (formerly of the auction house Doyle New York, and now with Lillian Nassau LLC) and Antiques Roadshow Host Mark Walberg spent a few minutes talking car mascots, including a little Rene Lalique Car Mascot talk, with some good video to go along with the chitchat.
So check out the Museum Website, where you’ll find a ton of great info and cool photos in addition to the ones here. And if you’re ever in Kalamazoo, take a pleasant half-day, put the top down and head over to Hickory Corners, where you’ll cruise into American Automobile and Rene Lalique History!
* The demonym (that’s a word used to describe local people which uses some local stuff in the word) Michigander is credited to Abraham Lincoln! Yes, The Abraham Lincoln! On July 27, 1848, Lincoln was making a speech in the U.S. Congress as a member of the Whig Party and a representative from Illinois, when he made of fun of Lewis Cass, the Governor of the Michigan Territory, by calling him “The Great Michigander!” If Lincoln only knew how well it would stick! What the heck, he carried Michigan in both his Presidential elections.
Rene Lalique Jewelry and Unique R Lalique Objects from 1900 and earlier are the focus of the Lalique Exhibition (and a couple of other guys stuff as well) titled Artistic Luxury, which we have written about several times previously in this R Lalique Blog (Lalique Exhibitions). This great Lalique Exhibition started out in Cleveland at the world class Cleveland Museum of Art, and moved earlier this year to the Legion of Honor Museum near the Bay in San Francisco where it will remain on view until May 31st.
What a great opportunity on so many levels. First and foremost was the chance to see some amazing unique R.Lalique objects that we may never have a chance to see again. And conveniently, we have been promising the whole staff here at RLalique.com some well earned all expense paid travel, for the great work on the website. Even more conveniently, San Francisco is but a short flight from the Arizona desert, but a world away in too many ways to recount fully in this article. A great vibrant City with hustle and bustle, crowds, traffic, noise, high rise buildings, and a really big body of water close at hand. None of these things are associated too often with our usual surroundings; the Sonoran Desert. All things considered, we had a trifecta of great excuses to shut things down for a week, and head to the hills (literally and figuratively).
So, RLalique.com journeyed en masse and incognito (that’s right – incognito – so no press conferences, no scholarly lectures, no private tours, no autographs, no glad handing of Museum personnel, no local TV appearances, and no photos of our wonderful staff, 🙂 for a great tourist visit to the exhibition.
We encamped in toto at the first great hotel in the heart of the City that was able to set aside, in spite of our last minute request, the floor of view rooms we needed (see photo from the floor window). And in moments, RLalique.com World Headquarters West was rolling. With the flip of just one electronic switch, the mountain of Lalique information from thousands of places around the globe that daily pours into the desert oasis that we usually call home, was re-routed across hill and valley, freeway, lake, and mountain, and dumped onto the top floor of our new temporary lodgings. And of course, in between 10 miles a day of walking, 50 cable car rides, a highlight tour of San Francisco Steakhouses (well, the tour was one stop per day at the dinner hour and was self conducted), as well as Muir Woods, Napa, Sonoma, Fisherman’s Wharf, Knob Hill, Chinatown, Haight-Ashbury (yes, there is still the smell of marijuana in the street),
Golden Gate Park (who says the homeless have no home… they are at home – in Golden Gate Park, and we spent a lot more time talking to the people in the park than to anyone else on the trip with the exception of a nice couple from Devon England discussed below), the Japanese Gardens (green tea with sweet and spicy treats in the finest outdoor garden atmosphere), Castro Street and Alcatraz (expected to see some people we know there, but turns out they closed the prison a while back and don’t have any criminals there anymore), and other activities that are but a San Francisco foggy memory in the blur of an insane tourist adventure, we managed to spend several hours at the exhibition. And yes, that is the longest run-on sentence we could construct.
Of course we didn’t forget that we walked the Golden Gate Bridge one end to the other and back, our group joined by a honeymooning couple from Devon England that we met while hanging out on the pier. Above is a photo of Mr. Incognito himself, contemplating the distant Golden Gate Bridge from his perch on the Alcatraz Ferry in San Francisco Bay while pondering the upcoming traverse!
A small side note to the Fisherman’s Wharf visit. Our newest intern, a refugee from an east coast institution of higher learning (higher on what we have know idea), smarmily whispered to another staff member upon arrival at the Wharf: “Now I know why we’re here, those must be Lalique Seals!” Will Rogers famously remarked that it takes most people at least five years to get over a college education. NI (newest intern) might take a bit longer!
Which brings us to the first mistake of trip. Landing in typical San Francisco bad weather on a Tuesday morning (see the accompanying photo of the Golden Gate Bridge – OH! You can’t see the bridge? That’s because it’s totally foggy, a rather persistent condition apparently in SF, and to be fair to the weather, maybe cold, wet and foggy is considered good weather up there, don’t really know), we headed over to the exhibition after a great lunch in a small neighborhood establishment in one of the run down areas of town where the locals are great and the food is better, AND we were the only tourists in sight. Of course, in a re-enactment of a longstanding San Francisco tradition, it took longer to find parking spaces for the RLalique.com convoy than to eat lunch. But it was worth it. The sun broke thru the clouds for 7 minutes and 46 seconds as we enjoyed sidewalk dining (well, technically we were eating off of tables and not the actual sidewalk) at its finest. Seriously, a few small tables, great food and great service. Sorry, but the restaurant is so small we cannot give out the name here, as with our extensive worldwide audience, the place would be over-run in days, all the locals and regulars would be crowded out, and when the excitement died down, the owners would have a bunch of mad locals that found somewhere else to hang out and our endorsement would be a curse instead of a blessing. And most importantly, when we make our way back up north for SF II, sequel to the movie, at some point in the next decade or two, the restaurant might not be there anymore for our encore appearance if all of the above occurred! So we promised the owners that we would not spill the beans.
Anyway, off to the Legion of Honor Museum we go, the entire RLalique.com caravan sans police escort (think incognito), making only one detour along the way to peruse the lodgings at some upscale little housing development along the water. We arrive in the drizzle of course, only to find out that Tuesday is FREE admittance day to the museum. That is the good news. The bad news was a bit bigger. First, FREE museum does not mean FREE exhibition! Apparently, the basement of the museum is not part of the FREE area. OK, the $10 “Special Exhibition” charge was obviously no big deal and was half what we expected to spend on each ticket, BUT it turns out that to save the regular museum charge of $10, which would have been on top of the Special Exhibition charge of $10, a lot of San Francisco people go to the Exhibition on FREE Tuesday to pay half the normal total price of admission. So it was crowded. Which is a good thing in the big R Lalique picture, but which caused some minor inconvenience in viewing each of the great items close up and in the preferred casual and relaxed manner. And to think they had other people there! Hmmmmmm! At first, we thought the crowd was there because word of our visit had leaked, and the staff opinion is still split 50/50 about whether a leak occurred or not. It’s still one of the many great unknowns of the trip.
Notwithstanding the mob scene and the true reasons for the huge crowd, it was a great assemblage of amazing R.Lalique objects, which half the staff feels is probably why there was mob scene! And here is a photo of your humble correspondent in deep thought over this whole perplexing “Leak or Lalique” situation (as it came to be known by our security staff), while sitting in front of the Legion of Honor Entrance!
Ignoring those other guys whose stuff was on exhibit, the Rene Lalique items were GREAT! What can you say about the apparently unique black glass scarab vase with the rust red coating lent to the exhibition by the Musee des Art Decoratifs in Paris, which acquired it directly from Rene Lalique in 1911 for 1000 French Francs? Which was sitting right there next to the unique Grenouilles Et Nenuphars Vase recently acquired by the Cleveland Museum for it’s permanent collection (having sold at Christies New York in December 2006 on a very cold New York day)!
The coolest and most striking Rene Lalique object was the “sugar bowl” owned by the Gulbenkian Museum in Lisbon. The body is constructed of writhing serpents, with glass blown inside the open serpent framework, and sporting an incorporated lid. The entire staff of RLalique.com unanimously voted this to be the one object most needed to compliment our World Headquarters Tea Set. No sugar, no tea you know. Of course we would purchase this great Lalique unique object in two seconds if it came up for sale, which is easy to say in the most braggadocio fashion because the Gulbenkian doesn’t sell it’s works of Rene Lalique! 🙂
The Lalique Jewelry (yes, and the Lalique jewellery) was fantastic as well, and there was a lot more Rene Lalique unique jewelry than unique objects. Amazing items, delicate in a way that Lalique’s contemporaries did not match, and stylish and refined in a way no one has ever equaled! Fabulous all ’round. And we all still want to meet a beautiful woman wearing a large and unique Rene Lalique ‘bodice ornament”.
If you have time before the 31st, it’s a wonderful trip and a great opportunity to view some of the finest output of the great Rene Lalique. Where else do you see the lily of the valley at the museum and at the Japanese Garden on the same day?
And of course, if you want to purchase the catalogue book of the Exhibition, the amazing 372 page complete hardback version with great color illustrations and some highly insightful commentary, just visit the Rene Lalique Books Library right here at RLalique.com and check it out, along with the other fabulous Rene Lalique exhibition books and catalogues we have assembled and made available to you from around the world.
Lalique and Haviland Join Forces and Open A Joint Flagship Store in London: A renewal of old ties between the family name of Rene Lalique and the family name of David Haviland was cemented in London recently, with the opening of the new Lalique Haviland joint flagship store on Conduit Street. This store name recalls ties between these two great families that go back to 1916.
Here is a brief history: Haviland was started in 1842 by David Haviland. He was a member of a New York family that imported and sold china. In the early 1840’s he traveled to Limoges France where he founded the great Haviland manufacture. His two sons, Charles and Theodore were active in the business, Theodore in New York dealing with marketing matters, and Charles, the oldest of the two sons in France at the factory in Limoges. After David Haviland died in 1879, Theodore moved to Limoges to participate more directly in the management of company affairs. For whatever reasons, by 1891 the two brothers had irreconcilable differences and joint control of the Haviland Company was dissolved, with each brother going it his own way. Charles operated under the old family company name of Haviland et Cie, and Theodore under the name Theodore Haviland Limoges. The two brothers competed not just with other companies, but against each other. The last decade of the 19th century also saw the rise of the great Rene Lalique, who’s reputation as a jeweler and designer in Paris had spread worldwide. Lalique’s primary focus in the last decade of the 1800’s was jewelry and unique objects. It was the famous glassmaker Emile Galle who recognized Rene Lalique as the “the inventor of modern jewelry”.
In 1892, Lalique had a daughter by his second wife, whom they named Suzanne. Suzanne became an accomplished designer and painter in her own right, without any formal art training. Growing up as close to the great Lalique as one can get, was all the training required. Her vase designs cover two pages in the R Lalique Catalogue Raisonne, and her paintings and decorative arts are now spread around the world. At least two Rene Lalique production vases were designed by Suzanne Lalique; the vases Sophora and Penthievre. She also created great porcelain designs for Haviland during the last half of the 1920’s and into the early 1930’s, and she is credited with having painted in 1931 the only recorded portrait of Rene Lalique created late in his life. And of esoteric interest to both historians and stemware collectors, is the SH monogram which graces the stemware set Monogramme in the Catalogue Raisonne. These are the stems that start at #5042 on Page 831 of the 2004 edition. These stems were sold in minimum orders of 100 pieces. But for the big order, Lalique et Cie would put your own monogram on each stem. That’s probably how they figured out the name for this design! Apparently, Suzanne Haviland was an early customer :).
As things would have it, in 1916 Suzanne met the photographer Paul Haviland, the son of Charles Haviland, when Paul was slightly older than shown here in an 1884 portrait at age 4 by noted painter Pierre-Auguste Renoir. Paul was an accomplished photographer, and among his other claims to fame, he would be given photo credit for the pictures in the 1932 R.Lalique Catalogue, a fact omitted from the 1981 Dover reprint! Paul was born in Paris, but graduated from Harvard and spent much of his early life in the United States. Having been called back to France to help with the management of the company in 1916, that same year he met and by 1917 would marry Suzanne Lalique. Long story short, Charles died in 1921. Theodore died two years earlier in 1919. The Haviland et Cie family businesses of Charles had lots of problems and became a full employment company for lawyers! Haviland et Cie eventually slipped out of family ownership and was liquidated in 1931, but the Theodore branch of the family continued on with their company under the leadership of Theodore’s oldest son William, who had joined the company in 1903 and who took control upon the death of his father. The Haviland name and company was restored to unity and total family ownership in 1941 under William Haviland, when he and other relatives purchased all the names, designs, and rights of the previously liquidated Haviland et Cie. One interesting point is that from 1942 to 1957, Haviland was produced in Pennsylvania, production having been started up there by William in the chaos that was World War II.
Fast forwarding a bit, control of Haviland would find its way to the current owners Financiere Saint-Germain (FSG). Here is a link to an informative Haviland website. Why do we care about all this? Well, that’s the start of another (much shorter) story.
In February of 2008, the Lalique Cristal Company was acquired by the Swiss company Art & Fragrance (ARTN). The price was €44,000,000 Euros, which today would be about $58,500,000 US. This was somewhat of a marriage of equals, as Lalique’s sales of around €67,000,000 Euros for 2007 were higher than the sales of its acquirer. Art & Fragrance is headquartered near Zurich, and its shares are listed on the BX Berne eXchange under the symboi ARTN. It appears that the vast majority of ARTN shares are controlled by Silvio Denz, the Chairman of ARTN, who is shown here in a photo from the company website. Mr. Denz is also one of the driving forces behind the new Lalique Museum, the Musee Lalique in France which we recently wrote about. In September of 2008, Art & Fragrance sold just under 1/2 of Lalique to FSG, which as we mentioned, is the owner of among other things, Haviland, at a price of 20.5 million Euros. This is how we have reached the point of the accompanying photo of the new London Flagship Store. This writer thinks Paul and Suzanne Haviland would be smiling if they could see it! And now you know……… ( think Paul Harvey). 🙂
A final note: Paul Haviland died in 1950, and Suzanne Lalique Haviland, having lived to the age of 97, died in 1989. For more information on Rene Lalique and his family, see our Rene Lalique Biography.
Here is a link to a video where Nicholas Dawes Appraises an R Lalique Perfume Bottle in Los Angeles for the 2008 U.S. Antiques Roadshow. In addition to being a longtime Antiques Roadshow appraiser, Nick is currently in charge of organizing and conducting live auctions for Mastro Auctions, which has a great group of R Lalique items coming up for sale in Chicago on December 13th. See our R Lalique at Auction Section where you’ll find a link to more information about the upcoming Mastro auction at the top of the page. We’ll post more information about this upcoming sale as it becomes available in the near future. Meanwhile, a VERY happy R Lalique owner in the video!
And you can save yourself a long wait in a roadshow line by checking out the Rene Lalique Appraisals page here at RLlaique.com
Check out this BBC Report about the R Lalique Cire Perdue Vase that sold last week at Christies South Kensington. It was purchased for £1 at a “car boot” sale and brought to the Antiques Roadshow for appraisal and then to Christies to sell. Don’t you love stories like this?
BUT, closer to the ancestral home of RLalique.com, consider the story of a Tucson Arizona man named Carl Rice. Carl frequented weekend garage and estate sales in the Tucson area. His biggest profit ever on the re-sale of one of his weekend finds, was the $55 he had made selling a $25 purchase for $80! On June 16th 1996, as was his habit, Carl perused the estate sales listings in his local paper, and then he headed off to an estate sale at the home of the recently deceased 94 year old Martha Nelson, where the representatives of her estate were clearing out her possessions. There in the Nelson home, Carl bought a pair of paintings off the wall for the asking price of $88. He then re-sold the pair at Christies New York in December of 1996 for over One Million Dollars! That’s right, over $1,000,000! A local Tucson gallery owner saw the Christies catalog noting the Nelson estate provenance, and mentioned it to the representatives for the dead lady’s estate. They of course mentioned the good fortune of Lucky Carl to their lawyers, and Lucky Carl quickly found out that just as night follows day, lawsuits follow lawyers. They sued Lucky Carl in January 1998, claiming that it was somehow his responsibility to let them know they had underpriced the paintings by $1,071,912! This ridiculous lawsuit dragged on for nearly three years until December 2000 before being tossed out by the Arizona Court of Appeals. Somehow we have the feeling that Lucky Carl, while a little less lucky, is a whole lot smarter for the experience.
One final note about the case of Lucky Carl. The gallery owner that saw the provenance in the Christies catalogue and ratted out Lucky Carl, was quoted in the Tucson Daily Star newspaper as follows: “If you are going through an estate sale, YOU have a responsibility to say you are aware this is such a valuable painting.” Sure, that’s why people go to boot sales, garage sales, estate sales and the like. So that they can appraise and authenticate items for the sellers, and help the sellers identify hidden treasures. And here we thought all the people in Tucson lived on the same planet as the rest of us. We stand corrected.
And the moral of the story: It can never hurt to consult with an expert before selling. If you need an appraisal on your R Lalique items, check out the Rene Lalique Appraisal page here at RLalique.com.
Article number 5 has appeared in the great series on bid rigging and collusion at auctions running in the Maine Antiques Digest as part of their series on Auction Law and Ethics written by a lawyer familiar with auctions and the law. We have been reprinting the articles in this series here at RLalique.com with the permission of the author and the assistance of the Maine Antique Digest so that they will be available directly on our website for our fellow RLalique enthusiasts. All articles in this Bid Rigging Series are linked in our Articles of Interest page here at RLalique.com. This page can also be accessed from the link in our Navigation Section on the right hand side of any RLalique Blog page. You can also directly access the latest article in the series, the 5th article, by clicking on the title – Auction Law and Ethics: The $64,000 Question. We agree with the author that when bidders collude, it is a serious problem for all auction participants, and that all bidders at auctions should be aware of the laws about bid rigging and collusion. We highly recommend these articles to you and welcome your comments.
The Maine Antique Digest has a monthly column dealing with Auction Law and Ethics. Each article is written by an expert auction lawyer. The current series deals with bid rigging and collusion among bidders. We have been reprinting the articles in this series here at RLalique.com with the permission of the author and the assistance of the Maine Antique Digest so that they will be available directly on our website for our fellow RLalique enthusiasts. Four articles in this Bid Rigging Series have appeared, all of which are linked in our Articles of Interest page here at RLalique.com. This page can also be accessed from the link in our Navigation Section on the right hand side of any RLalique Blog page. You can also access the 4th article in the series directly by clicking on the title – Auction Law and Ethics: Sleep Well. We agree with the author that when bidders collude, it is a serious problem for all auction participants, and that all bidders at auctions should be aware of the laws about bid rigging and collusion. We highly recommend these articles to you and welcome your comments.
Here is a great short Rene Lalique Biography and History video interview with Gerard Tavenas. This is an informative video, mixing historical information about Rene Lalique with current video of modern crystal making today. You can find out more about Rene Lalique on our Rene Lalique Biography Page.
If for any reason the video does not appear, here is a LINK to it.
The Maine Antique Digest is running a great series on Auction Law and Ethics, written by an attorney who is familiar with auctions and the law. The current series deals with bid rigging and collusion among bidders. As of the launching of our Blog, three articles have appeared, all of which are linked in our Articles of Interest page at RLalique.com. This page can also be accessed from the link in our Navigation Section on any Blog page. We agree with the author that when bidders collude, it is a serious problem for all auction participants, and that all bidders at auctions should be aware of the laws about bid rigging and collusion. We highly recommend these articles to you, and welcome your comments.
The October 16th issue of the “Antiques & Auction News”, the antiques publication that bills itself as “The Most Widely Read Collector’s Newspaper in the East!” has an extensive article covering the highlights of what collectors should be aware of in the area of fake Lalique and other dodgy items passed off as RLalique. The article, titled “Fooled By Fakes: Buyer Beware! Rene Lalique Art Glass by Anita Stratos”, also includes a discussion on color changed radiated pieces, as well as advice on how to protect yourself by being well informed.
We’ve posted the article in its entirety with the generous and kind permission of the author Anita Stratos, in our 
We noted for the fakes article, that the incidence of fake Lalique items is much less than in many other fields, but as you can see from our 
It’s in the interest of all R Lalique collectors to have widely available information in this area, and to have a large overall knowledge base of public information that purchasers can access to get educated. This article is another step in the right direction of increasing public awareness and education. Check it out.
The piece most often appearing in exhibitions and photos around the world (including the accompanying photo from Wikipedia Commons) is the 9 Serpents pectoral* owned by the 
But another great Serpents motif jewelry piece also appears at exhibition from time to time, this one owned by the 
In the early 1920’s, the Prince headed off to Paris for military studies. There he was seriously injured in a car accident in 1923. His wife came to Paris to help nurse him back to health, and they both were still in Paris in 1925 when the 1925 Exposition Internationale Des Arts Decoratifs took the world by storm. Apparently, it took the Asaka family by storm as well, and the new art deco style, decoratif art in everyday life, caught their fancy.
In 1929, they began work on an Art Deco residence in Tokyo that was completed in 1933. While the Ministry of Imperial Household oversaw the design and construction, the input of several of the great French decorative arts practitioners, notably Rene Lalique, and to a larger degree Henri Rapin (to whom the Prince entrusted the interior design of 7 of the rooms), made the house a model of modernist art deco restraint and style. The architectural contributions of Rene Lalique included the glass panel doors, and the chandeliers in the dining hall and grand guest room.
In July 1966, the 
Basically the former heartland of the industrial Midwest during the salad days of U.S. manufacturing! A lot of money was made here and stayed here in the form of public projects by wealthy people and companies. The Gilmores established a foundation that owns the museum and carries on, despite the passing of both Gilmores several decades ago.
So, what does the Gilmore Car Museum have? Where to begin, hmmm. Let’s start with the Blue Moon Diner, a real 1941 diner, picked up in toto from Meridian Connecticut, and moved here to the Michigan countryside! And yes, they serve pecan pie and frozen custard. Over 200 autos, from a 1948 “Waltz Blue” Tucker (number 47 out of a total production of only 51), to a Dusenberg! There’s a re-created 1930’s Shell gas station (including memorabilia from a Shell station just 3 miles from the Gilmore that closed during WWII), a small town train station, nine antique Michigan barns, and three miles of paved roads, as well as a huge collection of vintage pedal cars and miniatures. You may see their authentic London Double Decker bus tooling around the property when you visit, and it’s rumored (though not advertised) that a ride in a cool old vehicle might be had from time to time!
The museum is important in many other respects. For example, The Pierce-Arrow Society (the Roadshow video linked below features a Pierce-Arrow with the Rene Lalique Car Mascot Archers) established its museum at The Gilmore. As a result there are a wide array of Pierce-Arrows on display, one of the coolest of which is a 1912 motorcycle. Note that the entire museum grew out of a gift from Mrs. to Mr. Gilmore of a Pierce-Arrow project car needing renovation. Also, the Tucker Historical Collection and Library, a project of the Tucker Automobile Club of America (the “Car of the Future”) is at the Gilmore. Heck, they even have a Chrysler Turbine Car!
Rene Lalique Jewelry and Unique R Lalique Objects from 1900 and earlier are the focus of the Lalique Exhibition (and a couple of other guys stuff as well) titled Artistic Luxury, which we have written about several times previously in this R Lalique Blog (
Which brings us to the first mistake of trip. Landing in typical San Francisco bad weather on a Tuesday morning (see the accompanying photo of the Golden Gate Bridge – OH! You can’t see the bridge? That’s because it’s totally foggy, a rather persistent condition apparently in SF, and to be fair to the weather, maybe cold, wet and foggy is considered good weather up there, don’t really know), we headed over to the exhibition after a great lunch in a small neighborhood establishment in one of the run down areas of town where the locals are great and the food is better, AND we were the only tourists in sight. Of course, in a re-enactment of a longstanding San Francisco tradition, it took longer to find parking spaces for the RLalique.com convoy than to eat lunch. But it was worth it. The sun broke thru the clouds for 7 minutes and 46 seconds as we enjoyed sidewalk dining (well, technically we were eating off of tables and not the actual sidewalk) at its finest. Seriously, a few small tables, great food and great service. Sorry, but the restaurant is so small we cannot give out the name here, as with our extensive worldwide audience, the place would be over-run in days, all the locals and regulars would be crowded out, and when the excitement died down, the owners would have a bunch of mad locals that found somewhere else to hang out and our endorsement would be a curse instead of a blessing. And most importantly, when we make our way back up north for SF II, sequel to the movie, at some point in the next decade or two, the restaurant might not be there anymore for our encore appearance if all of the above occurred! So we promised the owners that we would not spill the beans.
Notwithstanding the mob scene and the true reasons for the huge crowd, it was a great assemblage of amazing R.Lalique objects, which half the staff feels is probably why there was mob scene! And here is a photo of your humble correspondent in deep thought over this whole perplexing “Leak or Lalique” situation (as it came to be known by our security staff), while sitting in front of the Legion of Honor Entrance!
The Lalique Jewelry (yes, and the Lalique jewellery) was fantastic as well, and there was a lot more Rene Lalique unique jewelry than unique objects. Amazing items, delicate in a way that Lalique’s contemporaries did not match, and stylish and refined in a way no one has ever equaled! Fabulous all ’round. And we all still want to meet a beautiful woman wearing a large and unique Rene Lalique ‘bodice ornament”.
If you have time before the 31st, it’s a wonderful trip and a great opportunity to view some of the finest output of the great Rene Lalique. Where else do you see the lily of the valley at the museum and at the Japanese Garden on the same day?
Lalique and Haviland Join Forces and Open A Joint Flagship Store in London: A renewal of old ties between the family name of Rene Lalique and the family name of David Haviland was cemented in London recently, with the opening of the new Lalique Haviland joint flagship store on Conduit Street. This store name recalls ties between these two great families that go back to 1916.
In 1892, Lalique had a daughter by his second wife, whom they named Suzanne. Suzanne became an accomplished designer and painter in her own right, without any formal art training. Growing up as close to the great Lalique as one can get, was all the training required. Her vase designs cover two pages in the 
As things would have it, in 1916 Suzanne met the photographer Paul Haviland, the son of Charles Haviland, when Paul was slightly older than shown here in an 1884 portrait at age 4 by noted painter Pierre-Auguste Renoir. Paul was an accomplished photographer, and among his other claims to fame, he would be given photo credit for the pictures in the 1932 R.Lalique Catalogue, a fact omitted from the 1981 Dover reprint! Paul was born in Paris, but graduated from Harvard and spent much of his early life in the United States. Having been called back to France to help with the management of the company in 1916, that same year he met and by 1917 would marry Suzanne Lalique. Long story short, Charles died in 1921. Theodore died two years earlier in 1919. The Haviland et Cie family businesses of Charles had lots of problems and became a full employment company for lawyers! Haviland et Cie eventually slipped out of family ownership and was liquidated in 1931, but the Theodore branch of the family continued on with their company under the leadership of Theodore’s oldest son William, who had joined the company in 1903 and who took control upon the death of his father. The Haviland name and company was restored to unity and total family ownership in 1941 under William Haviland, when he and other relatives purchased all the names, designs, and rights of the previously liquidated Haviland et Cie. One interesting point is that from 1942 to 1957, Haviland was produced in Pennsylvania, production having been started up there by William in the chaos that was World War II.
In February of 2008, the Lalique Cristal Company was acquired by the Swiss company 
Here is a link to a video where 
BUT, closer to the ancestral home of RLalique.com, consider the story of a Tucson Arizona man named Carl Rice. Carl frequented weekend garage and estate sales in the Tucson area. His biggest profit ever on the re-sale of one of his weekend finds, was the $55 he had made selling a $25 purchase for $80! On June 16th 1996, as was his habit, Carl perused the estate sales listings in his local paper, and then he headed off to an estate sale at the home of the recently deceased 94 year old Martha Nelson, where the representatives of her estate were clearing out her possessions. There in the Nelson home, Carl bought a pair of paintings off the wall for the asking price of $88. He then re-sold the pair at Christies New York in December of 1996 for over One Million Dollars! That’s right, over $1,000,000! 
A local Tucson gallery owner saw the Christies catalog noting the Nelson estate provenance, and mentioned it to the representatives for the dead lady’s estate. They of course mentioned the good fortune of Lucky Carl to their lawyers, and Lucky Carl quickly found out that just as night follows day, lawsuits follow lawyers. They sued Lucky Carl in January 1998, claiming that it was somehow his responsibility to let them know they had underpriced the paintings by $1,071,912! This ridiculous lawsuit dragged on for nearly three years until December 2000 before being tossed out by the Arizona Court of Appeals. Somehow we have the feeling that Lucky Carl, while a little less lucky, is a whole lot smarter for the experience.
One final note about the case of Lucky Carl. The gallery owner that saw the provenance in the Christies catalogue and ratted out Lucky Carl, was quoted in the Tucson Daily Star newspaper as follows: “If you are going through an estate sale, YOU have a responsibility to say you are aware this is such a valuable painting.” Sure, that’s why people go to boot sales, garage sales, estate sales and the like. So that they can appraise and authenticate items for the sellers, and help the sellers identify hidden treasures. And here we thought all the people in Tucson lived on the same planet as the rest of us. We stand corrected.
