GABRIEL, ANGE-JACQUES

also called Jacques-ange Gabriel born Oct. 23, 1698, Paris, France died 1782, Paris French architect who built or enlarged many chteaus and palaces during the reign of Louis XV. He was one of the most important and productive French architects of the 18th century. The most celebrated member of a family of architects, he was the son of Jacques V (16671742), whom he succeeded as premier architect to Louis XV and director of the Academy of Architecture in 1742. Gabriel was the chief architect for most of the major building projects undertaken during Louis XV's reign. Under him the royal chteaus and palaces were redesigned, enlarged, or renovated in order to satisfy Louis' standards of personal comfort. Among Gabriel's royal commissions were enlargements or extensions of the chteaus of Fontainebleau (1749), La Muette (1746), Compigne (1751), and Choisy (1752); additions to the Louvre (1755) in Paris; an ambitious project for the Palace of Versailles (1763), including the completion of its right wing and the building of the Opera House and the Petit Trianon there; and the construction of the cole Militaire (1752) in Paris. Gabriel provided virtually all of the royal residences with theatres, also built pavilions and hermitages for some of them, and designed hunting lodges in the major royal forests. The magnificent Place Louis XV (now Place de la Concorde) in Paris (1755) demonstrates his talents as an urban planner. Gabriel was not a great innovator but rather was an extremely competent builder whose structures exhibit a noble simplicity in the austere but harmonious arrangement of their masses and their subdued classical decoration. He excelled at endowing large structures with majestic proportions, as exemplified in the cole Militaire. He was also notable for his use of attached columns in place of pilasters, in both exterior and interior facades. His best-known work is the Petit Trianon at Versailles (1762), which is universally famous for its harmonious proportions and elegant, Palladian-inspired lines.