Christofle

The death of Joseph Bouilhet left his widow Rosine Christofle-Bouilhet in charge of the family's fortunes. Charles Christofle himself became part of that fortune when Rosine persuaded her daughter to marry her much older uncle. Rosine Bouilhet's other child, Henri was just seven years old at the time of his father's death and he was to play a still more central role in the development of the family empire.

Charles Christofle found himself at the head of a prosperous firm whose work was known not only in France and Europe but also in South America and Madagascar. The company produced jewels, metal fabric, silver filigree, decorations for French army uniforms - the very first pieces known to bear the Christofle stamp were the gilded buttons made to decorate French officers’ uniforms and special pieces for foreign courts.

Charles was a man of taste and a careful observer of advancements in the arts, sciences and technology as well as social developments and he knew that the new bourgeois class agreed with the message of Franςois Guizot (then prime minister to King Louis-Phillippe): “Frenchmen, enrich yourselves through work and savings!” He also knew that this new class, desiring recognition and refinement no longer wanted to keep its money in silverwork but preferred to invest in the stock exchange or industry.

The patents to make use of the process of silverplating and gold plating by electrolysis were purchased from the Elkingtons.

The young Charles Christofle was a visionary captain of industry. He raised significant capital and received financial backing from his brother-in-law, Joseph Bouilhet, a bourgeois member of the Ancien Régime who was then living off a private income. Christofle convinced Bouilhet to purchase (from Englishmen Henry and George and Richard Elkington of Birmingham England) the patents for a revolutionary new electroplating process for bonding silver or gold to a metal base by electrolysis This was a radical departure from traditional silver- and gold-plating methods that used mercury and were both time-consuming and highly toxic. Goldsmiths worked with heated mercury, inevitably inhaling the lethal vapours.

He also negotiated to purchase the patents held by the French chemist Count Henri de Ruolz - this was a brilliant strategic move.

One of the very first factories in the world to use electricity was opened. This was a large factory (that was in operation until 1933) on the Rue de Bondy in the République district of Paris facility. This was entirely dedicated to the new plating techniques, placing the whole of the family business's future on the success or failure of this new endeavour.

This was a technologically advanced manufacturing plant on an industrial scale and permitted the application of plating of a wider variety of objects than ever before to more common (and less expensive) metals.

Now thanks to new electrolysis processes objects are simply dipped in vats. Connected to the cathode of an electric source, they are coated with molecules from a sheet of precious metal that is connected to the anode and dissolves when subjected to an electric current.

This step firmly embarked Christofle on its legendary course as manufacturing silversmiths and Christofle was able to undertake custom work for various silversmiths. At the beginning, however, Christofle preferred to establish a reputation for high quality, limiting his activities to plating works created by other gold and silversmiths.

Charles Christofle founded ‘Charles Christofle et Compagnie’ along with several associates. He stamped all silver plated metal pieces with a hallmark in order to guarantee quality of the silver used for his plated objects and he was compelled to take legal action against numerous rival imitators. Backed by the Bouilhet fortune, Christofle successfully defended his exclusive patent rights before the French tribunals.

Christofle had already established the company's silverplating to a far higher percentage (92.5 percent) of silver than his competitors. Meanwhile, unable to find commissions for his plating technique, Christofle decided to launch the family into the production of its own line of products.

Christofle extended his factory's production to include a variety of objects, especially related to table service. In this he seemed to have captured the spirit of the times, as a rising class of French bourgeoisie began to aspire to similar luxuries as the country's fading nobility. The so-called 'arts de la table' suddenly became part of the required dining room furnishings. Christofle offered the new ‘middle class’ silverware and table service with the same commitment to quality but far less expensive than traditionally crafted sterling silver items. Before long, the Christofle name became something of a generic name for silver-plate.

Christofle became the official provider of table service for King Louis-Philippe and the entire House of Orléans. In 1850, the company received a new and important benefactor when Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte commissioned Christofle to produce a table service for the Palais de l'Elysée. Christofle's relationship with Bonaparte continued after the latter became known as Emperor Napoleon III. Christofle's official titles of 'Goldsmith to the King' and the 'Emperor's Provider' provided the company with the foundation with which to achieve a new international expansion. Founding a factory in Karlruhe, Germany, the company began providing such foreign dignitaries as the Kaiser of Germany and the royal households of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Ottoman Empire, and the Tsar of Russia.

Christofle also proved to have a strong commercial sense. Hiring a dedicated sales staff, he arranged a number of contracts with retailers worldwide. In exchange for giving a merchant the exclusive right to sell Christofle's products in a particular town, Christofle claimed space in the merchant's street-side shop windows and the retailer agreed to carry only Christofle's line of table service in his shop. At this time, Christofle also established the Pavillon Christofle retail store in Paris.

Charles Christofle died at the age of 58 and the business was taken over by Henri Bouilhet (1830 – 1910) who expanded the company's business and firmly established the business's industrial approach to luxury goods. This was a departure from the traditional artisan-based industry of the time. Bouilhet was a shrewd businessman and also an astute engineer. He was partnered in his tenure by the son of Charles Christofle, his cousin, Paul Christofle (1838-1907). The cousins followed Charles’s strategy of expansion by opening new markets, introducing new technical developments and expanding the factories

Working with Hermann von Jacobi of St Petersburg Henri invented a new method of plating not just silver and gold but bronze, copper and other metals as well. This new method (called galvanizing) permitted Christofle to begin producing more monumental works. Among the company's most notable productions were the gold-plated bronze winged statues at the Opéra Garnier in Paris, the railroad car for Pope Pius IX, and a 10 metre tall statue for the Notre Dame de la Garde church of Marseilles.

Christofle was reincorporated as a public limited company, becoming Christofle SA. The Borletti family became major shareholders and important financial backers into the next century.

Carla Borletti was not merely a source of new capital for the company, she also proved inspirational in building a new generation of Christofle. She had exceptional taste and used her influence to guide the firm into commissioning designs from some of the most gifted industrial designers, architects and sculptors of the 20th century. At the same time Borletti helped establish a new retail concept for the brand using the Pavillon Christofle name established by Charles Christofle in the mid 1800’s. The company began opening its first foreign branches of the Pavillon Christofle retail chain. The Borletti family's sponsorship enabled Christofle to convince its banks to provide new investment capital.

Machinery was confiscated by the German occupation forces and the silver market collapsed presenting a new interruption to Christofle's growth.

However the great economic expansion of the postwar period helped the company achieve a new scale of international expansion.