Vintage Louis XV Style Italian Brown & White Marble Mantel

Brown and white speckled marble fireplace mantel surround with a heavy serpentine apron decorated at the center with a scrolled acanthus motif. The angled vertical pilasters are adorned with classic carved corbels.

This design epitomizes the emerging aesthetics of the Louis XV period, which was characterized by curved forms versus the more formal, box like furniture preceding Louis XIV. This fireplace is unused and has never been installed. It was acquired by Olde Good Things in unopened wooden crates labeled from Italy, and stated by the seller to have been produced in the 1970s.

The mantel is in very good to excellent condition, having a highly polished surface. A barely perceivable imperfection exists in the “non-gradual expansion of the angle” carved on the face of the right side of the right pilaster. It is cut there as a straight line in opposition to the expanding rising angles cut on the other three lines.