Great Halls of Discovery
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Style Revival Great Halls of Discovery Fashionable preludes to the modern museum, cabinets of curiosities were diaries of record for well-traveled collectors— and fascinating glimpses of worlds unknown. FROM LEFT, TOP TO BOTTOM: Framed butterflies, $575; lolofrenchantiques.com. • Natural bamboo coral, $3,820; klaus-dupont.com. • Galapagos brass ant, $195; bluecarreon.com. • Gecko paperweight, $145; bluecarreon.com. • Faux tortoise boxes, from $70; haydenpaints.com. • English Grand Tour neoclassical Romanesque intaglio in walnut frame, $225; chairish.com. • Natural mineral specimen on sterling silver base, $2,100 per set; 1stdibs.com. • Malachite specimen and Malachite pyramid, $300 each; creelandgow.com. • Butterfly in round reliquary, $650; creelandgow.com. • Mounted ostrich egg, $450; creelandgow.com. • Feather crown, $3,820; klaus-dupont.com. • Mosasaur fossil, $15; architecturalheritage.com. 34 VERANDA PHOTOGRAPH BY Brian Woodcock • PRODUCED BY Rachael Burrow • WRITTEN BY Ellen McGauley Style Revival OR HER CONTEMPORARIES, it was LEFT: Photographer Massimo Listri’s latest release, Cabinet quite the thrill. The carefully assem- of Curiosities (Taschen, 2020), bled curios amassed by Margaret reveals more than 20 of the Cavendish Holles Harley Bentinck, world’s most extraordinary F wunderkammers, from 18th- second Duchess of Portland, appeared bound- century naturalist Clément less. All manner of naturalia, from shells and Lafaille’s oceanic specimens birds’ eggs to her own drawings of molluscan (above) to the fresco-canopied mineral cabinet at Seitenstetten species, mingled with decorative delights Abbey in Austria (below). like French snuffboxes and Italian cameos. A frequent visitor described the rarities in 1769 as “a most capital collection of pictures, numberless other curiosities, and works of taste…I was never more entertain’d than at [her home] Bulstrode.” The assemblage was notable not just for its scale and value, but for its collector. Most ABOVE: This year, de pioneers of early cabinets of curiosities (also Gournay debuted a called Kunstkammer or wunderkammers, for bespoke wunderkammer rooms of wonder) were men—naturalists wall design, inviting clients to “collect” the and explorers, architects and apothecaries, objects and ephemera who, like the duchess, set out to largely to be painted onto the uncharted lands and returned with unfamil- shelves. Cabinet of Curiosities wallpaper, iar oddities. It was a pursuit for the intensely from $2,177 per panel; curious that arose during the early years of degournay.com. the Renaissance among scholars, who would collect and catalogue objects they found, from TASCHEN. OF LISTRI/COURTESY MASSIMO © MINERALIEN-KABINETT, DAS AND LAFAILLE CLÉMENT DE NATURELLE D’HISTOIRE CABINET 36 VERANDA Style Revival At his former home at London’s Malplaquet House, Tim Knox’s rarities were composed in a med- ley of portraiture and sea wonders, animal skulls and religious statuary. great animal fossils and intriguing Collection and co-author of The minerals to architectural remnants Rebirth of an English Country House: and hand-crafted objects. (Many St Giles House (Rizzoli, 2018). “A trophies defied categorization, which few remarkable scholar-collectors in itself served as a qualifier for formed the vanguard, and then noble their acquisition.) and royal collectors followed as the So robust were these collections pursuit became fashionable.” that entire rooms were comman- Well-scaled collections carried deered and curated for their display. considerable prestige, a notion not In England, “the cabinets [which lost on young aristocrats setting referred to rooms, rather than fur- out on their Grand Tours. “This niture] formed from the 16th to 18th was a rite of passage for educating centuries, the great ages of inquiry oneself through art and culture,” ABOVE: The earliest known depiction of a cabinet of curiosities was that of Ferrante Imperato of and discovery,” says British historian says rare-curios dealer Jamie Creel, Naples; in the 1599 sketch are zoological finds Tim Knox, Director of the Royal noting that as one collects, the eye from chameleons to a ceiling-mounted crocodile. • CASE STUDIES • Early collectors took great care in commissioning custom cabinets for their curios, often crafted of unusual hardwoods (like ebony or walnut) and thoughtful embellishments suggestive of the prizes inside. Cabinet of curiosities, Melchior Baumgartner cabinet; Herman Doomer cabinet; Swiss Baroque cabinet, $398,500; msrauantiques.com. metmuseum.org. metmuseum.org. $11,000; chairish.com. DEBEERST. PHILIPPE HOUSE, MALPLAQUET 38 VERANDA Style Revival CLOCKWISE FROM RIGHT: Artful arrangements at Kabinett & Kammer in the Catskills, Munich’s Kunstkammer, and De Vera in New York “Items from newly discovered lands were clearly prized, along with anything made out of precious materials... and feats of virtuoso craftsmanship.” —TIM KNOX, DIRECTOR OF THE ROYAL COLLECTION becomes more focused and the cabinet more refined. And value was inexorably WONDER tied to exoticism, Knox and Creel agree. EMPORIUMS “Items from newly discovered lands were Today’s finest curiosity shops clearly prized, and anything made out of are bound by feast-worthy displays precious materials like rhinoceros horn, in the spirit of early collectors. rare shells and minerals, and extraor- dinary feats of virtuoso craftsmanship,” says Knox. Adds Creel, “I personally love the story of the six-foot narwhal tusk explorer Mar- KUNSTKAMMER tin Frobisher gifted Queen Elizabeth I.” With shops in Munich and London, owner Georg Laue It was thought to be a sea-unicorn horn, holds particular renown and “it ended up being one of the most for sourcing Renaissance- prized possessions in her collection.” era exotica made from precious materials, mar- By the late 18th and 19th centuries, the vels like a narwhal-ivory cabinets gradually gave way to “more sculpted cup, mother-of- rational and ordered museums,” says pearl flask, and chess set made entirely of amber. Knox. The items became more familiar, kunstkammer.com and by the 20th century, much had gone to public displays, been sold, or put in attics. CREEL & GOW An appetite for the wondrous and Owner Jamie Creel’s fas- weird still exists. Intensely beautiful cination with collecting began as a teenager in collections by omnivorous masters like Kenya, trading Levi’s for Umberto Pasti, Jacques Garcia, and handmade baskets. In Knox himself call to mind those of early his Upper East Side shop, curios range from pioneers, many of which are now public, majolica coral lobsters Sir John Soane’s Museum in London, The and papier-mâché masks Cooper Hewitt Museum in New York, to a Chinese opera head- dress. creelandgow.com and the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum in Connecticut among them, says Creel. KABINETT & KAMMER DEYROLLE DE VERA “It’s the lost collections that excite me,” Author of a forthcoming Founded in 1831 in Paris’s Beyond rarities like says Knox, citing the ever-curious Duch- tome (Vendome, 2020) 7th arrondissement, 18th-century devotional ess of Portland. An auction held less than sharing title with his the sustainable taxi- figures and Chinese gilt Catskills boutique, artist dermy shop feels like a silver tea caddies, Federi- a year after her death lasted 38 days, with Sean Scherer curates a natural history museum. co de Vera’s Manhattan only 8 of those dedicated to items other beguiling assemblage out Wild specimens include gallery introduces his own than natural artifacts. Countless other of a 19th-century post entomological displays jewelry designs crafted office. Expect anything set in a jungle of pre- of Mediterranean coral, cabinets have likewise been dispersed from visual teaching aids served creatures from Middle Eastern stones, through sales, making for fascinating new to scientific ephemera. flamingos to big cats. and Grand Tour intaglios. kabinettandkammer.com deyrolle.com deveraobjects.com eras of rediscovery. ✦ MUNICH/LONDON. LAUE, GEORG KUNSTKAMMER OF COURTESY KUNSTKAMMER ABRANOWICZ; WILLIAM KAMMER, & KABINETT VERA; DE OF COURTESY VERA DE 40 VERANDA .