Art, Architecture, Collecting
This absorbing book tells the story of Empress Eugénie (1826–1920), the wife ofNapoleon III and the last Empress-Consort of France. Today she is rememberedfor her physical beauty, for her influence as a taste maker and for her glitteringcontribution to the second imperial court – but she outlived the Second Empire by halfa century and lived in exile in England.The Empress bought the Farnborough Hill estate in 1880, following a decade of personaltragedy: the collapse of the Second Empire (1852–70), the death of Napoleon III, and theloss of her only child. The death of the Prince Imperial in 1879, aged 23, ended all hope ofa Bonapartist restoration. With the imperial succession removed to another branch of thefamily, Eugénie resolved to create a permanent monument to her husband and son. Thiswas her primary reason for moving to Farnborough. This book describes the little-knownassemblage of art and architecture that she created there in the 1880s.Geraghty analyses the principal buildings on the imperial estate: Farnborough Hillitself, which was extensively remodelled for the court-in-exile that Eugénie maintainedthere from 1880 to 1920; and St Michael’s Abbey, the spectacular domed mausoleumthat the Empress built on an adjacent hill in 1883-88. These projects were entrusted toa French architect, Hippolyte Destailleur (1822-93), whose erudite designs situated thehistory of the Second Empire within the longer history of French architecture and design.Geraghty also provides the fi rst detailed account of the lost interiors of FarnboroughHill. He traces the origins of the collection back to the Second Empire, and—drawingupon historic photos, inventories, and sale catalogues—he shows how the collectionwas displayed in the principal rooms of the house. Primarily dynastic in purpose, thedisplay included a major sequence of Bonaparte family portraits, including works byDavid, Gérard, Winterhalter, and Carpeaux. Eugénie also had an important collectionof decorative arts, including Gobelins tapestries, Sèvres porcelain, and royal Frenchfurniture.Composed by the Empress herself, the display at Farnborough Hill was the lastmanifestation of the ‘Louis XVI-Impératrice’ mode of interior decoration that she hadpopularised in the 1850s. It was also, in its juxtaposition of modern and historic pieces,the fi nal expression of the nouvelle sociabilité of the second imperial court.Finally, the book describes the breakup of the estate in 1927, when the house wassold to a convent school and the collection was dispersed at auction. Today, only theMausoleum functions as Eugénie originally envisaged. Geraghty, however, recovers thetotality of Eugenie’s vision for Farnborough. In so doing, he describes how the Napoleonicideal, for one fi nal time, was made visible through art, architecture, and collecting.
