Louis Quatorze

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. adj. Of, relating to, or characteristic of the baroque style in architecture, furniture, and decoration of the reign of Louis XIV.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. An epithet designating a style of architecture and decoration prevalent in France in the reign of Louis XIV. (1643-1715), and copied in other countries. It is especially characteristic of palaces and large mansions of that period. Externally the forms are in a freely treated classical style, and rustication is much employed; the windows are larger and the rooms more lofty and spacious than in buildings of the time immediately preceding, and there is a constant effort to attain majesty and sumptuousness. The palace of Versailles and the eastern colonnade of the Louvre are prominent examples of Louis-Quatorze. The style is characteristically illustrated in internal decoration, the favorite medium of which was gilt stucco-work combined in figures uniting lavishness with studied symmetry and balance of parts. The scroll and shell appear as familiar details, and panels—either rectangular or nearly rectangular in form, sometimes severely plain, sometimes ornamented—are commonly present as a main feature of the design. The classical ornaments and all the elements of the earlier Renaissance styles are admitted, but are treated with the modifications imposed by the spirit of the age. In decorative art the Louis-Quatorze style embraces several new methods of decoration, such as incrusted work and the free use of veneers of precious woods, as well as the mounting and ornamentation of furniture in elaborate designs of gilded bronze, applied as lock-plates, hinges, handles, etc. The forms of panels, of pieces of furniture, and the like become more varied than in the earlier Renaissance, and the ornamentation has but little reference to natural forms. The richly inlaid furniture of Boule (see buhl) surpassed all previous work of this kind.

GNU Webster's 1913

1. n. Of, pertaining to, or resembling, the art or style of the times of Louis XIV. of France.