Art Decó elevator landing ~ RMS Queen Mary.
My hobby when i was a kid was to read about big ocean liners. This is my favorite.
SS Normandie. She was to be the fastest,the sleekest,and the most artfully decorated. But her first distiction would be as the premier ship to exceed 1000 feet (313m) in length.
The ship would be launched on October 29,1932 and all all of France,and indeed the world,would be following the events of the launch. The largest object ever set in motion by man at the time.
Sadly,on February 9,1942, during a continuing conversion work,a fire broke out aboard the ship and the future of the magnificent Normandie would be smothered in suffocating cloud of smoke. Charles T. Collins,an 18 year old USN ironworker gave an account of the incident.
Her fate: http://www.historynet.com/the-fate-of-the-ss-normandie.htm
Silver Dinner Service for Normandie, Jean Puiforcat (French, 1897-1945)
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Note the stylized monogram of Normandie’s operators CGT, Compagnie Generale Transatlantique, on each piece in the service.
In Honor of Normandie’s maiden voyage, Wednesday, May 29, 1935
A Diagram of Appartements de Grand Luxe, Normandie
*“The creme de la creme suits were positioned about two-thirds of the way to the ship’s stern, on the uppermost deck, the Sun Deck. These were the Trouville and the Deauville Suites. Each had four bedrooms, a living room, a dining room, a pantry, a servant’s bedroom and five baths or half baths….The Trouville…was distinguished by a drawing room carpeted with a dark, velvety broadloom, most of which was covered by white area rugs interwoven with graceful patterns of tiny flowers. At the room’s center stood a table with a thick glass top on a three-legged white wooden pedestal….The other grand lux suite, the Deauville, was just as big and as beautiful as the Trouville, although its layout and decor were entirely different. There were two other suits on the Main Deck, three levels down, that almost rivaled them: the Caen and the Rouen….The classic lines of the [Caen Suite’s] bedroom were set off by a blue lacquer mural sprinkled with silver and decorated with panels of etched glass, ‘a fitting setting,’ said one promotional booklet, ‘for its furniture, which is covered in Chinese sharkskin.’….One step down from these sybaritic accommodations were the ten apartments de luxe….Each suite de luxe was decorated by a different designer, mostly in variations of Art Deco.” – Normandie: Her Life and Times, Harvey Ardman
In Honor of Normandie’s maiden voyage, Wednesday, May 29, 1935
SS Normandie. Built 1935 for the French Line, Compagnie Generale Transatlantique. Destroyed by fire at Pier 88, Manhattan, New York City on February 9th, 1942. by vox3000 on Flickr.
Iconic (almost Brutalist) poster for Normandie, CGT.
The S.S. Normandie, seen from a Staten Island ship steaming through upper bay on its way to a river pier built for it, ca. 1935-1941. (Courtesy NYC Municipal Archives) #
