Hubert Martinet, a clockmaker active in London and Paris in the third quarter of the 18th century, is the author of the astronomical clock in the museum. He designed sober but technically very accomplished clocks. He is also known for his elephant clocks, amusing automatons that have amazed collectors...

In the political turmoil at the end of his pontificate, Pope Pius VI is deposed and driven out of Rome. The Directory forces him to leave for France. Catholic families welcomed this old man, exhausted after his crossing of the Alps and who was to die in Valence. They are thanked by the abandonment of a few relics, such as this slipper which entered the museum's collections through the Pelleport-Burète bequest in 1932...

The production of the C.A.B factory - Céramique d'Art de Bordeaux (1919-1947) - was characterised by systematic technical research, as shown by this vase recently deposited in the museum by a Bordeaux collector, Robert Coustet: firing experiments, choice of earthenware, treatment of glazes, drips, etc. The quality of the ceramics produced by C. The quality of the ceramics produced by C.A.B. interested the art workshop of the Printemps department stores' to the point that C.A.B. became the privileged partner of Primavera, which at the time enjoyed a national and international reputation...

This terracotta bust, an allegorical representation of America, occupies a central place in the museum, where it adorns the fireplace of the Salon de compagnie. Its author is unknown, probably a French artist, in the second half or even the last quarter of the 18th century...

This miniature on ivory by Nicolas Le François, painted in 1788, shows Anne-Jacobé de Caumont La Force, Countess of Balbi, sitting at her pianoforte. Lady-in-waiting of the Countess of Provence and favourite of the future Louis XVIII, she is one of the famous characters of the revolutionary period...

The enamelled glasses of Alphonse Giboin (1828 - 1921) are among the curiosities of the Musée des Arts Décoratifs.
At the end of the 19th century, this cultivated man, a retired civil servant in Libourne, demonstrated his mastery of the recently rediscovered techniques of enamel on glass. He created glass objects inspired by the Arab-Persian Orient, Japan or historicism in vogue at the time...

This precious and rare toilet consists of eight finely chiselled pieces, made by a Parisian master goldsmith, Jean-Charles Fauché, between 1749 and 1750. The unusual story of this set and its arrival in the museum's collections...

After nine years of hesitation between the restoration of the monarchy and the adoption of a republican constitution, the Third Republic triumphed in 1879 with the election of President Jules Grévy. The Count of Chambord, heir to the French throne, became the target of very virulent criticism...

This precious early 19th century mother-of-pearl fan belonged to Marie Caroline de Bourbon (1798-1870), Princess of Naples and Sicily, who became the Duchess of Berry and the mother of the Duke of Bordeaux, Count of Chambord, who embodied the hope of a final restoration of the monarchy for the Royalist Legitimists. Its iridescent grey mother-of-pearl strands, engraved with Chinese characters, are held by a fine blue silk ribbon. The object perfectly evokes the carefree years, at the court of Louis XVIII and Charles X, of the intrepid princess...

The Proust geometrica armchair (2001) is a new version of the Proust armchair proposed by Alessandro Mendini in 1978. Mendini revisited a classic style chair, mocking the banality of mass-produced products, and designed a version in which each piece was hand-painted in the manner of Signac. In 2001, he reformulated the project, this time covering the chair with coloured geometric forms, in a pastiche of abstract painting...