Louis XV furniture
Louis XV furniture was designed not for the vast palace state rooms of the Versailles of Louis XIV, but for the smaller, more intimate salons created by Louis XV and by his mistresses, Madame de Pompadour and Madame DuBarry. It included several new types of furniture, including the commode and the chiffonier, and many pieces, particularly chairs and tables, were designed to be moved easily rearranged or moved from room to room, depending upon the kind of function.
With the death of Louis XIV on 1 September 1715, his grandson, Louis XV, born in 1710, became King. Because of his young age, France was ruled by a Regent, Philippe of Orleans, until 1723. During this period, the style of furniture changed little from the Louis XIV period; it was massive, lavishly decorated and solemn, designed for the gigantic state halls of the new Palace of Versailles. In 1722 Louis XV moved from Paris, where he had lived with the Regent, to Versailles, began his own rule, and gradually imposed his own taste on the arts, architecture, and furniture.
Louis XV of France
Louis declared war on England on 9 June 1756, and success seemed certain. A French fleet in the Mediterranean defeated the British at the Battle of Minorca of 1756, and captured that island. The French army greatly outnumbered the British and Prussians on the continent. The French army won the surrender of the British forces of the Duke of Comberland at Closterseven. Another French army invaded Saxony and Hanover, the ancestral home of King George II. However, the best French commander, Maurice de Saxe, had died two years after the War of the Austrian Succession, and the new French commanders, Charles, Prince of Soubise, the Duke D'Estrees and the Duke de Broglie detested each other, and were rarely willing to cooperate.