Pine Wall Shelf, Les Arcs 1800, Circa 1970

Wall-mounted pine china cabinet by Charlotte Perriand, a design created in 1952 for her own apartment on Rue Las Cases in Paris, then adapted in 1967 for the interiors at Les Arcs.The story of this piece of furniture begins in Charlotte Perriand’s personal world. In the early 1950s, she furnished her apartment on Rue Las Cases as a true domestic laboratory, designing furniture directly tied to its intended uses and the optimization of space. This china cabinet was born out of this context, designed to store and display tableware while freeing up floor space. Perriand retained this model in her personal design vocabulary, as it can also be found in her chalet in Méribel—another key location in her relationship with the mountains and the home. Its presence in her own interiors demonstrates how much she viewed certain pieces of furniture not as static creations, but as solutions she could revisit, develop further, and adapt to different spaces.

In 1967, while working on the interior design for Les Arcs, she once again adapted the china cabinet for the resort’s apartments. From her Paris apartment on Rue Las Cases to the chalet in Méribel, and then to Les Arcs, the journey of this piece of furniture traces nearly twenty years of Charlotte Perriand’s exploration of a single principle: designing furniture that is simple, functional, and closely integrated with architecture. Crafted from pine, the china cabinet consists of two side posts with characteristic curved cutouts, connected by various horizontal elements. Its wall-mounted design frees up floor space and perfectly addresses the need for space that defines the compact apartments in Les Arcs.

Our example comes from the Les Belles Challes residence in Arc 1800.

Provenance: Les Belles Challes, Arc 1800, Les Arcs, France.

Bibliography:Jacques Barsac, Charlotte Perriand. The Complete Works, Volume 3, 1956–1968, Éditions Norma, Paris, 2017, p. 330.Jacques Barsac, Charlotte Perriand. The Complete Works, Volume 4, 1968–1999, Éditions Norma, Paris, 2019, pp. 75, 145, and 147.