Tales in toile

While archaeological excavations have uncovered printed textiles in Pakistan’s Mohenjo-daro dating from 2500 - 1500BC, hand-block printing techniques did not reach Europe until trade routes expanded under the East India Company. Known as ‘Indiennes,’ these imported and European-made imitations of traditional lightweight, hand-block printed Indian chintz captivated the European market in the 17th century. 

Unlike locally produced linen, wool, and silk textiles, Indian cottons were washable and painted or printed in vibrant colourfast inks. Their popularity and usability threatened French mills who successfully lobbied the government to implement an almost 100-year ban on imported cotton, however, this was loosely enforced and largely ignored by aristocrats such as Madame de Pompadour who reportedly decorated an entire room in printed toile.

Many European manufacturers began printing toile textiles following the lifting of the ban in 1790, but none proved more famous or enduring than those produced in the French village of Jouy-en-Josas by Christophe-Philippe Oberkampf.

Born into a German family of textile dyers, Oberkampf travelled widely to learn the art of engraving and printmaking before taking a position at the Koechlin-Dolfuss mill in Mulhouse, on the French-Swiss border. In 1758, Oberkampf moved to Paris to work as a colourist and engraver for Sieur Cottin before setting up his own mill in the village of Jouy-en-Josas, strategically located between Versailles and the source of the Bièvre River. Here Oberkampf had access to the wealthy aristocracy and the vast amounts of fresh water required to print textiles.

While Oberkampf is widely credited as the master of toile de Jouy, producers all over France were telling stories in printed cotton and it was Francis Nixon, an Irishman, who in 1752 invented the copperplate technique which enabled detailed repeats to be printed on a large scale. Aided by this industrial innovation, Oberkampf’s business and reputation flourished quickly. King Louis XVI awarded the designation of Manufacture Royale in 1783, followed by a knighthood in 1787, and by the end of the 18th century the copper rollers printed 5000m of toile de Jouy per day, a level of production so impressive that Emperor Napoleon awarded him the Legion d’honneur in 1806.

Oberkampf’s success lay in his ability to produce less expensive saimoises (a blend of cotton and linen) for the middle classes which utilized only two or three woodblocks or small floral ‘mignonettes’ made by copper rollers. While luxury cottons featuring copperplate, single-colour prints were reserved for his wealthier clientele, including Madame de Pompadour and Marie Antoinette herself. 

Although Oberkampf often purchased or copied engravings from craftspeople in the United Kingdom, he also employed renowned French artists including Jean-Baptiste Huet, Louis-Jean Francois, and Hippolyte Le Bas to create bespoke scenes, capturing his customer’s imaginations whatever their interests were. 

Current events such as the American and French Revolutions were depicted alongside contemporary operas and novels, Greek mythology, and chinoiseries. As art historian and archivist Sophie Rouart tells Architectural Digest, “When you look at toile de Jouy in an interior, you can travel from your bed. It’s very magical to be with Figaro [from The Marriage of Figaro] or witnessing the first hot-air balloon.”

One of the Oberkampf Manufactory’s most famous copperplate prints depicts the textile printing process. Designed by Jean-Baptiste Huet and printed in 1783, ‘Les travaux de la manufacture’ is composed of fourteen carefully integrated scenes including Huet and a female colleague sketching outdoors, dyers preparing the colours, printers applying the hand-blocks, and the printed fabric drying in the meadow. 

Textiles depicting myths, legends, or pastoral narratives have been carefully conserved over the centuries due to their unique storytelling properties, and while Oberkampf’s factory produced 650 bucolic prints floral designs were by far the most popular style, of which they produced over 30,000. 

Despite falling out of fashion in the early 1800s, modern renditions have been used by first lady Jacqueline Kennedy to decorate the White House, incorporated as a house motif by Christian Dior and reimagined by current head designer Maria Grazia Chiuri, a mainstay of textile collections by Pierre Frey and Schumacher, and reinterpreted by designer Shelia Bridges to tell the story of her ancestors in her Harlem Toile de Jouy, it’s clear that the desire to tell tales in toile isn’t going anywhere.