Helping Versailles return to its silver glory

Misfortunes of the past and present have combined to give furniture from Denmark's Rosenborg Castle a leading role in an exhibition at France's Versailles Palace.

The exhibition 'When Versailles was Furnished in Silver' attempts to recreate the splendour of Louis XIV's court from the period when the palace was furnished in silver. In order to do so, it has called on castles and palaces from around Europe to lend the exhibition any furniture created in the style of the time.

Rosenborg is the home of Europe's largest collection of such furniture, and as the exhibition's co-host, has contributed 70 of the exhibit's 200 pieces.

Louis XIV was forced to melt down the original furniture in 1689 in order to finance a war. But during their short time in existence, the furniture inspired a number of other European royal houses to commission pieces in a similar style.

In Denmark, the trend lasted from 1680 to 1720, and resulted in the most expensive furniture created in the kingdom at the time. Even though the pieces were silver leaf, and not the solid silver of the Sun King's court, they were reportedly so expensive that the contracts to build them were held as state secrets at the time.

However, the existence of the furniture in Denmark is one thing. Permission to borrow national treasures - even if the request comes from Versailles - is another.

'Normally, we'd never permit them to leave the country,' Niels-Knud Liebgott, director of the Royal Danish Collection at Rosenborg, said.

But thanks to a project to restore the Copenhagen-based castle's floor that needed more extensive work than was originally believed and would have otherwise meant putting the furniture in storage, permission was granted to loan the pieces out.