King Louis Xiv's Influence On 17th Century France

Baroque defined Louis XIVs power; highly ornate and extravagant in architecture, art, music, and style. Absolutely everything that belonged to the royal and their courtier in 17th century Paris exceeded any normal expectation of luxury and indulgence. Ruling through over seven decades, many would say King Louis XIV impacted France more than any other king in history. By receiving “divine right”, Louis XIV birthed an absolute monarchy that loved to flaunt their status a la mode and art. When Louis XIV came to the throne in 1643, style was but a thing in France, but with great power comes being extremely influential. Through his reign, Louis became commander of taste where fashion trends now only derived from his court. The king believed that

During this time mirrors defined your social status due to their expensive price and short supply. To create a massive hall filled with mirrors during the 17th century, as Louis XIV did, was merely an ostentatious gesture to showcase his opulence and competence in being king. Seventeen mirrored arched windows faced seventeen arched mirrors that were merely made up of smaller mirrors. Since mirrors could only be built 28 inches high, 21 mirrors were assembled into arch form, meaning that the entire hall itself contained 357 mirrors total. Here King Louis XIV would pass through daily from his bedroom to the chapel. Many of the extravagant social events were held here due to its beautiful interior space, even having the Treaty of Versailles signed in its location.

“The very act of a person seeing himself in a mirror or being represented in a portrait as the center of attention encouraged him to think of himself in a different way. He began to see himself as unique. Previously the parameters of individual identity had been limited to an individual’s interaction with the people around him and the religious insights he had over the course of his life. Thus individuality as we understand it today did not exist: people only understood their identity in relation to groups—their household, their manor, their town or parish—and in relation to

With the rise of the restaurant in the 18th century, mirrors still take role as an important décor among the many that are fabulously wealthy. Restaurants, much like their patrons, were divided into different economical classes; the bourgeoisie, who could spend a dime or three on their meals, the working middle class, and those who dreamed of enhancing their prosperity. For a restaurant to be of importance and economize, they had to lure the opulent in with décor similar to rococo. Trends that began with Louis XIV, still lived on decades later:

“Oh you wanted to economize! If that’s the case, you shouldn’t be in the restaurant business. The ladies, the dandy young men, the handsome lawyers, and the prissy abbes, what will they do here if there aren’t any mirrors? This little Sunday lawer who has jus bought his mistress a restaurant, what will he do? What will she do, in the hour they sit here, if they don’t have a mirror in front of them to tell them that at each instant, they have the air, the manners, the appearance, he of a president of the Parliament, and she of a