Enameled Summit
maisonverrsen@gmail.com
In the aftermath of World War II, Charlotte Perriand, returning from Asia in 1946, resumed her research into modern, functional, and accessible housing. Continuing the work she had begun in 1939 with the Bureau Central de Construction (BCC), which she founded with Pierre Jeanneret, Jean Prouvé, and Georges Blanchon, she developed prefabricated construction solutions combined with integrated furniture.
In the late 1940s, this work culminated in the first furniture collection entitled “Equipment for the Home,” designed with Pierre Jeanneret and produced in Grenoble. This furniture embodied a simple, minimalist, and functional approach, designed to meet the real needs of its users.
It was in this context that Perriand, a passionate mountaineer, returned to Méribel, a resort envisioned in the 1930s by her friend, the Scottish developer Peter Lindsay. It was Peter Lindsay who approached her around 1949 for several projects, notably the design of the “Le Vallon” and then “Le Doron” hotels, as well as individual chalets.
She applied her principles of functional living, adapted to mountain life, in collaboration with the architect Christian Durupt, thus extending Peter Lindsay’s vision: an architecture that was integrated, coherent, and modern.
The “Enameled Summit” exhibition is part of this history, presenting rare seating designed by Charlotte Perriand and Pierre Jeanneret for the Hôtel du Vallon in Méribel in 1949.
These pieces are displayed alongside later creations made for the hotels in Les Arcs 1600, including a series of enameled metal panels designed between 1967 and 1971.
The exhibition thus highlights the continuity of Perriand’s work, from Méribel to Les Arcs, driven by the same concern for adapting design to the needs of mountain life.
As she wrote in a manifesto in 1929, entitled "Wood or Metal?", "Metal is to interior design what cement was to architecture. It is a revolution."
The "Enameled Summit" exhibition will reveal a more intimate view of Charlotte Perriand's work on interior design in the mountains.
The enameling workshop in Saint-Maurice, in the Val-de-Marne, handled Charlotte Perriand’s commissions. But in 1970, due to financial constraints related to the progress of the Arc 1600 project, Roger Godino asked her to stop using this furniture. The manufacturing cost was too high. It would be replaced by lacquered metal, lacquered wood, or polyester.
Photography by Gaston Karquel, commissioned by Charlotte Perriand.
Hotel “Le Vallon”, 1949.
Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy at the Hotel “Le Vallon” in the 1950s.
From the book “Méribel: A Beautiful Story” by Annick Stein.
Skier in front of the “Le Vallon” hotel in the 1950s.