Rococo Architecture

Rococo architecture is a light, highly decorative style that emerged in early eighteenth century Paris and flourished under the reign of King Louis XV before spreading across Europe. It developed as a reaction against the heavier, more solemn forms of Baroque architecture typified by the Palace of Versailles, replacing dark, weighty ornament with pastel colors, ivory white and gold, and mirrors used to open up a sense of space. Its decoration favors asymmetrical compositions built from natural, curving forms such as shells, flowers and foliage, executed above all in stucco, a plaster material shaped and carved to striking, elaborate effect. Rococo is generally treated as an interior and decorative extension of late Baroque architecture rather than a wholly separate structural system, expressed most fully in the ornamented interiors of palaces, churches and townhouses rather than in their exterior massing.