Photograph - dining table, designed by József Rippl Rónai from the dining hall of the Andrássy Castle, Tiszadob

József Rippl-Rónai was commissioned by Count Tivadar Andrássy (1857–1905) in 1897 to design a dining room for the family’s mansion in Buda, on the Danube bank. (The mansion at 9 Margit Embankment was destroyed in 1945, and the plot is now occupied by the French Institute.) The artist was living in Paris at the time, and the dining room he designed was one of the first Art Nouveau interiors in Hungary. Rippl-Rónai’s time in the French capital coincided with the emergence of the new style, which was named after the gallery of Samuel Bing, whom Rippl-Rónai knew.

The sideboards, made from the mahogany specified by the designer, have a simple structure, with one having two doors in the centre, the other, one, framed by drawers underneath and open shelves on each side. Truly unique are the large stylized trees of the metal fittings on the doors and the ‘cloud’ motifs, also metal, in the upper section. The legs of the oval pedestal table make it resemble a flower in bloom. City dwellers’ longing for nature found expression in the rose bush motif of the glass window, which was part of the overall design, the embroidered folding screen, also decorated with rose bushes, the clouds of the glass ceiling, and the embroidered tapestry, entitled Woman in Red. Art Nouveau artists attached great importance to the overarching unity of interiors: in addition to the furniture and the works mentioned, Rippl-Rónai also designed plates and glasses for the dining room. The furniture was manufactured by Endre Thék.

After the death of Tivadar Andrássy, his widow, Countess Eleonóra Zichy (1867–1945) sold the mansion in Buda, after having the complete furnishings of the dining room transferred, in 1910, to the Tiszadob palace of her second husband, Gyula Andrássy Jr (Tivadar’s brother). The photograph was taken there, probably in 1912. The elements of the dining room’s furnishings were dispersed after the Second World War, and with the exception of the tapestry and a few plates and glasses, they have been destroyed or have unknown whereabouts.