Chandigarh to Create Inventory of Corbu/Jeanneret Furniture

Chairs designed by Pierre Jeanneret for Chandigarh, 1955.

An article posted Friday on the Indian Express website announced that a three-member committee convened by the government of Chandigarh, India, is assessing the value of site-specific furniture pieces designed a half-century ago by Le Corbusier and Pierre Jeanneret. As reported here, these objects are the remainders of hundreds that furnished Chandigarh’s civic and educational buildings when the administrative capital of the Punjab was built by Corbusier from scratch following India’s 1947 partition. Since then, dozens of pieces have been sold at auction in Europe and the U.S., prompting international calls for Chandigarh’s administrators to audit and guard their property more diligently. The city is apparently doing just that. According to the Express, Chandigarh’s government is giving its departments three weeks to submit inventories of all heritage items.