In the mid-1750s a new type of light horse-drawn carriage - a cabriolet - came into use in France and, in simplified form, in England. In June 1755 Horace Walpole informed his friend Horace Mann:

All we hear from France is, that a new madness reigns there... This is la fureur des cabriolets; anglice, one-horse-chairs, a mode introduced by Mr Child: they not only universally go in them, but wear them; that is everything is to be, en cabriolet; the men paint them on their waistcoats, and have them embroidered for clocks to their stockings; and the women who have gone all the winter without anything on their heads, are now muffled up in great caps, with round sides, in the form of, and scarce less than the wheels of chaises.

Cabriolet fans, which are generally of French production, were part of the fureur described by Walpole. They consist of two (or occasionally three) concentric fan leaves mounted onto the same sticks. The mount ‘usually consists of Parisian scenes - persons driving in cabriolets, or promenading’. Most surviving cabriolet fans have similarly muted (or faded) colours to those here. The Schreiber collection in the British Museum includes two mounted cabriolet fans with printed leaves. Such fans are datable to the period c. 1755-65.

In this fan cabriolets are shown on the main fan leaf, on the gorge and on the guard sticks. In her later years Queen Mary hung this fan - which was housed in a gilt display case - in her boudoir at Marlborough House.

This fan was formerly in the collection of Ida, wife of the 4th Earl of Bradford (who died in 1915). Lady Bradford was one of Queen Mary’s closest friends, serving her as Extra Lady of the Bedchamber until her resignation in 1928. In the same year she gave Queen Mary a sequinned silk fan, until recently on loan to the Victoria and Albert Museum.

Text adapted from Unfolding Pictures: Fans in the Royal Collection 2005