Fine antique French Belle Epoque or Edwardian era Grand Tour style souvenir jewel casket, a lovely box with thick beveled glass sides and eglomise (reverse painted) glass scene of the Reims Cathedral on top! Part hand painted and part colored photo or print with mother of pearl accents, this one is entitled "La Cathedral de REIMS avant guerre", translated to the Reims Cathedral before the warWe recently acquired several of these wonderful little French souvenir caskets and will be adding them in the coming weeks. This one with very thick beveled glass panels, six panels around the sides and the larger top with the scene transferred & painted on the under side.
"Eglomise" is the term applied to the back-painted glass panels in these old French souvenirs. Most of them date 1800s, though they were made up through about 1910 in this manner, too. Later ones often have a photo set in instead. The early ones are our favorites, sometimes a screened ink-line like drawing that is then hand colored, or sometimes a full miniature painting original, all worked on the back side of a panel or convex plaque of glass. There are sometimes open spots left and a final step is application of thin mother of pearl panels so that the windows shimmer with pearlescent light, or architectural details are pearl - you can see how fun those are. I'm listing a whole collection from this genre, one at a time
Very good condition. The thin mother of pearl accent strips appear to have moved a bit from their original placement and there are a few very small "bubbles" in the painted sky area. Possibly a small edge or corner nip but no larger chips or cracks to the glass. Original inner tufted silk or satin base pad/lining, quite tattered. See pictures for all measurements.
