Europe's Addiction to Chinoiserie

The word 'Chinoiserie' is derived from the French word for Chinese, 'chinois'. It emerged in the 17th century, a time when Europe was infatuated with Chinese style designs, and was used to refer to anything produced in the west that was stylistically Chinese, whether that be architecture, garden design, or art. In this documentary we will explore the history of 'Chinoiserie', from its origins to its proliferation, and will examine a surviving example of Chinoiserie furniture, a 19th century Victorian Chinoiserie table.

Music:

Sad and slow

[carloscecilio]

Since my youth I have always been fascinated by exquisite Chinoiserie, thank you so much for this excellently presented video with its wonderful illustrations. Bedankt.

[yingguojieke]

Your videos are outrageously good! Are you doing this as a hobby? if so its actually remarkable how good your production values are!

[daveeygdoeschinese]

Man this is great, its very hard to find channels that go into depth like this. Thanks allot for your effort.

[nomisli]

I never heard of this term until your video. Thanks very much.

Watching this video reminds me of some of the Chinese featured rooms in some royal palaces/residences like say in Schonbrunn Palace and Brighton Pavillion. Have you seen them in person before? Would you consider doing a video about them at some point? Thanks

[fashionadollar]

I AGREE 100% WITH THE COMMENTS BELOW. EXCELLENT!

[brianm]

I'm studying Chinese history and these videos have been excellent at helping visualize history. I saw your video on Sun Yat-sen in London. If you wanted to do a similar video, then a video on other expats living in London would be interesting as well. One book I'm reading, Lao She in London, mentions a place that has a plaque today mentioning he lived there.

[trolllo]

Subscribed because want you to keep making content 🙏

[TheNightshadePrince]

France did it better as they built a whole palace in the Chinese style which was demolished after a break up but the French are known for their drama and passion. :)

[rabbitazteca]

I like your traditional wear? What is it called and what era was it most popularly used?

[gwang]

Sir William Chambers should have built his pagoda with nine storeys instead of ten. Nine is numerologically the most powerful single-digit masculine number in Chinese tradition. Also the decorating dragons should have no wings (Chinese dragons mostly have none).
Europe's music and philosophy were influenced by China as well, by the way. Some of Debussy's works clearly betray Chinese influence, while some of the missionaries brought back and translated the Confucian classics, which exerted a serious impact on European thought.

[RovexHD]

The summer palace was likely inspired by French renaissance design.

[Tiberiotertio]

Hmm totally missing is the copying of Kraak porcelian from China in Delft which was very popular in the 17th century and can be seen in many still existing originals and in many Dutch 17th century paintings.

[baddudecornpop]

6:49 Chinese emperor lookin like a chad but with some suspect hands😂

[andytang]

Good timing i attached your Chinoiserie vid or shared it to quora to prove "Made In China" not "made in china" was the originator of quality before China was Raped, Ransacked, Pillaged by the collective imperialist West! and Japan lol

your vid may help prove point or destroy the myth that China is known for bad products or is always known for bad quality and China only ever copies!!!

when it was the West that was desperately trying to and failing to copy the "style" which was made up of various different Chinese goods and products from various different eras... the West was after the general Eastern and im sure everything from the East all got lumped in together in one homogenous style etc

I should in fact write this in that video lol

dont worry youre doing good.... because im using vid to debunk falsehood

[katrussell]

Good information. Thee instead of the is annoying, though.

[leongliyang]

Did someon said, "Chip and Dale"

😂😂😂

[fishercourt]

Unfortunately he’s pronouncing the word in an American accent or his second language is English, so I respect his way of pronunciation. It’s just not correct. I am fluent in French and English, so it just annoys me when people try to hard to seem like they’re really big in to the design style, then they must respect the actual word by pronouncing it the correct way.

He must not have any knowledge that pronunciation of certain words are just jargon style words.

[jwohrman]

The mispronounciations are too much to take.

[Alistair.Richmond]

Who is this person speaking here? They are definitely not British as they mispronounce so many words. It’s so cringeworthy! 😂