1784

Plate

In January of 1784, Marie-Antoinette, queen of France, ordered a dinner service for use in her newly redecorated apartments at the Tuileries palace in Paris. The service, numbering two hundred and fifteen pieces, was completed in May 1784. However, before it could be delivered, King Louis XVI presented the service as a diplomatic gift to Gustave III, the ruler of Sweden, on the occasion of his visit to Paris. Marie-Antoinette, determined to have a service without further delay, ordered the Sèvres factory to continue production of the pattern, and in August of the same year she received two hundred and thirty-nine pieces. Many of the same painters worked on both sets of porcelain, and it is therefore difficult to determine the service from which this plate comes.