PERCHELLET ET MONQUIGNON | PARIS | PART 1

Shoe box by
L.P. Perchellet
Paris

Elegant models by Perchellet and/or his successor Mounquignon, are owned by shoe museums and collections around the world: MET, Museum of the City of New York, Shoe Icons, Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, Charleston Museum; however very little is known about these two French houses.


L.P. Perchellet 
Collection of the Bata Shoe Museum. 
© 2014 Bata Shoe Museum, Toronto, Canada | photo: Ron Wood


The first record that we could find about Perchellet was the granting of the patent 68853 to Lucien-Donacien Perchellet, « cordonnier à Paris », located in Rue de Lamartine 7, Paris in 1865 for his « Chaussures à ressorts ». [1] 

Ten years later - 1875 - we find the Maison L.Perchellet located in Paris, Rue Louis-le-Grand, 26. [2] The Bata Museum in Toronto owns a pair of boots of this period, with the original shoe box edged with arsenical tape.

      

L.P. Perchellet 
Collection of the Bata Shoe Museum. 
Source: 17th Street


In 1881 it was established the societé en nom collectif Perchellet et Chaumette, fab.de chaussures, with a share capital of 70.000 fr., located in Rue St-Honoré, 356 at the corner of  Place Vendôme  [3].

In 1889 Perchellet was listed among the exhibitors at the Exposition de Paris and was awarded with the gold medal (later to be reproduced on the insole label). A few years later, the brand  was name-dropped by Paul Bercy in his short story «Mon Perroquet» as a «fashionable shoe-maker».



1890s | L.Perchellet
Label: L. Perchellet/Chaussures Brevetées/2 Place Vendome/Entrée: 356, r. St. Honoré/Paris
Model belonged to Fernanda Wanamaker | Source: Metmuseum

This pair of classic evening pumps (above) illustrates the French taste in the 1890s for a very short and tight vamp and high toe spring (up curve of the sole). American shoes of this period exhibit a much longer, shallow pointed toe with less spring. 
The superior quality of this pair by the noted Paris maker L. Perchellet is demonstrated by the refined S-curve of the sole and heel breast and the unusually fine silver-set rhinestone ornament.
[Source: Metmuseum]

Donated in 1959 at the Brooklyn Museum, the shoes once belonged to Fernanda Wanamaker



1890s | L.Perchellet
Label: L. Perchellet/Fabt. de Chaussures a Ressorts/Paris/2 Place Vendôme entrée Rue St. Honoré 356
Model belonged to Emily Warren Roebling
Source: Metmuseum


 The above pair of shoes in white satin, with a curved sole and a decorated strap, belonged to Emily Warren Roebling:
Emily Warren Roebling (September 23, 1843 – February 28, 1903) is known for her contribution to the completion of the Brooklyn Bridge after her husband Washington Roebling developed caisson disease (a.k.a. decompression disease). Her husband was a civil engineer and the Chief Engineer during the construction of the Brooklyn Bridge.
[Source: Wikipedia]



PERCHELLET ET MONQUIGNON | PARIS

PART 1

PART 2

PART 3



FOOTNOTES

[1] Catalogue des brevets d’invention pris du 1er janvier au 31 décembre 1865, Paris, Imprimerie et librairie de Mme V.ve Bouchard-Huzard, 1866 

[2] Le Rappel, July 29, 1875
Bulletin des lois de l’Empire français, tome XXX, Paris, Imprimerie Impérial, 1868

[3] Archives commerciales de la France : journal hebdomadaire, Paris, Jul 28, 1881

 

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