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FIRE IN THE EARTH
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of his bride, the Empress Eugenie, and her couturier,
M. Worth, influenced every important female in Europe for a period of
twenty years, so that the jewelers of Paris were handsomely patronized.
Thus, within a dozen years, Carrier was able to move into more
impressive quarters at No. 9 Boulevarde des Italiens.
Carrier's
in Paris had to pass through the agony of the great siege during the
Franco-Prussian War. The city was invaded, plundered, burned, and the
populace fled, and jewelry buying fled with it. Not until 1875 was
there any real revival of the luxury trade. Curiously enough, it was
sorrow over the French loss of Alsace and Lorraine that helped to
stimulate the jewelry business in 1871 and 1872. The first fetes in the
reoccupied capital were benefits for the suffering populace in the lost
provinces. Jewelers began to make all sorts of emblematic crosses,
medallions, chatelaines, and brooches, suggesting Alsace and Lorraine
in German chains. Men even wore cravat pins with the arms of the two
provinces set in diamonds and enamel. Another stimulant to the business
of Carrier, as to all great jewelers, was the appearance on the market
of large stocks of South African diamonds at a time when an acute
shortage was feared.
The
business remained in the house in Boulevarde des Italiens although the
management now was in the hands of Alfred Carrier, who had succeeded
his father, Louis-Francois, in 1874. Just before 1900, Carrier's moved
into the Hotel du Carrier at No. 13 Rue de la Paix where they were at
the time of the most recent German invasion.
The
New York store has kept pace with the Paris and London houses, although
today it is unquestionably the most important of the three. Since 1906
the New York house has been under the management of Pierre Carrier, a
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