François de Cuvilliés

François de Cuvilliés, sometimes referred to as the Elder (23 October 1695, Soignies, Hainaut — 14 April 1768, Munich), was a Belgian-born Bavarian decorative designer and architect. He was instrumental in bringing the Rococo style to the Wittelsbach court at Munich and to Central Europe in general.

Cuvilliés was so diminutive in stature that it was as a court dwarf that he first came to the notice of the then-exiled Max Emanuel, Elector of Bavaria, who detected the young dwarf's aptitude and had him tutored in mathematics, then underwrote his further education with Joseph Effner and sent him to Paris from 1720–24, where he trained in the atelier of Jean-François Blondel, On his return to Munich, he was appointed court architect, at first in conjunction with Effner.

At the Elector's death in 1726, for a time Cuvilliés worked at Schloss Brühl for the new Elector's brother, Clemens August of Bavaria. He provided designs for the chapel at Brūhl, (1730–40) and the hunting lodge Falkenlust (1729–40) but as Charles Albert's interests shifted to Munich, he also returned to Munich. There his fame was established by the decors of the Reiche Zimmer in the Munich Residenz, which had been damaged by a fire, 14 December 1729. The contents of the Schatzkammer fortunately had been spared, and Cuvilliés was commissioned to design the panelling of a new interior, to be executed by the court's premier carver Joachim Dietrich. with four rococo gilded console tables on scrolling legs with playful dragons.

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