Projet Des Embellissemens De La Ville Et Faubourgs De Paris [Urban Planning] / Poncet De La Grave, Guillaume Art & Architecture

SWEEPING ARCHITECTURAL REFORMS FOR PARIS, A CENTURY BEFORE HAUSSMANN. 8vo. 3 parts in 1 vol. (2), xiv pp, (15)-239 pp, (1); 224 pp; 192 pp, [1 integral blank]. Bound in contemporary mottled calf, spine richly gilt. With versos left blank for the reader’s personal observations. An excellent copy. Sole edition of this remarkable work describing in exceptional detail a proposed wholesale renovation of Paris including the Palais Royale, the Louvre, the Bibliothèque Mazarine, the city’s bridges and fountains, and every square, doorway, or quay the author can imagine. "This work is important for the history of Paris, particularly with regard to the plans for its physical and architectural evolution. [In it] he takes up ideas formulated by Voltaire or the architect Pierre Patte, concerning among others the Louvre, the city hall, theaters and cemeteries, he highlights the need to build new bridges and above all to equip with quays the parts of the City and the two banks which are without them. Although these projects did not immediately come to fruition, his work inspired the program for the development of the Seine thirteen years later The work was supposed to be dedicated to Abel François Poisson, marquis de Marigny (1727-1781), brother of the marquise de Pompadour and director of the royal buildings, but he refused this dedication in order not to give the author a public approval and interfere in the decisions of the authorities." (Ader auction record, 2022, for a different copy). Poncet de la Grave (1725-1803) – a lawyer by training – is nothing if not ruthless, but also eminently pragmatic. For example in Vol I, p. 181 he declares "that it would be advisable to demolish the two pavilions of the Collège de Mazarin, which greatly limit the Quai de Conti, and hinder the public way". He would like to create more open spaces in the city, but also proposes social projects such as the construction of a retirement home for elderly workers. The enormous expense of these new projects would be funded, according to his scheme, by a ‘Caisse des Embellishments’ which would raise money by taxing goods and people. Poncet de la Grave’s revolutionary approach to ventilating the city by demolishing entire buildings would be echoed only in the mid 19th century by the sweeping reforms of Haussmann. "His understanding that large parts of Paris had to be reformed was intuitive rather than theoretical, however, and although his ideas are detailed and specific, he targeted individual projects rather than the city as a whole." (Papayanis, pp. 22-23). The author arranged for the present work to be printed in a most striking manner, with each page’s verso left blank – so that his enlightened reader might make their own notes and observations on his proposals. To our knowledge, no surviving copy bears any such notes, alas! OCLC shows US copies at Columbia, Cornell, the Getty, and Stanford. * Papayanis, Planning Paris before Haussmann (2004), pp. 22-23, 38-39, and 49-52; Sarazin, Rêves de capitale: Paris et ses plans d'embellissement (2003), p. 31; Saint-Fargeau, Bibliographie historique et topographique de la ville de Paris, p. 46.