A. Carli Freres was a documented Belgian plaster, terracotta, marble and bronze casting firm based at 46-48 Rue de L’Olivier (Olivierstraat), Schaerbeek, Brussels (red circle on the map below).
It operated from the early 1900s until approximately 1970. The firm is documented in both French and Dutch Wikipedia, in Belgian municipal archives, and in the Belgian Chamber of Representatives naturalisation records.
The company was founded by Antonio Carli, who was born on 19 November 1868 in Bagni di Lucca (highlighted in yellow), Italy, and emigrated to Belgium in 1894. He established his atelier in Schaerbeek and became the first manager of the firm. The company specialised in religious figures in plaster, decorative pieces in terracotta and gypsum, and higher-quality work in marble, alabaster and bronze.
Known family members who worked in the firm included: Antonio’s brother Carlo Carli (birth date unknown); Carlo’s son Giovanni Ornido Carli (known as Ornido, born 10 March 1887, Bagni di Lucca); and Carlo’s son Giovanni Ambrogio Guido Carli (known as Jean and Guido, born 23 March 1895, Bagni di Lucca). Guido Carli succeeded Antonio as manager. Official documents describe Guido as “mouleur en platre” in 1909, “sculpteur de figurines en platre” in 1950, and “sculpteur, editeur d’oeuvres d’art” in 1951.
All known family members were born in Bagni di Lucca, placing A. Carli Freres squarely within the Lucchesia figurinai emigration tradition.
THE EGISTO QUESTION: WAS HE PART OF THIS FAMILY?
Egisto Carli was born in Italy around 1886. Carlo Carli’s sons Giovanni Ornido and Giovanni Ambrogio Guido were born in 1887 and 1895. Egisto’s birth year of c.1886 places him in exactly the same generational cohort as these two cousins — and a year older than Giovanni Ornido. The Belgian Wikipedia article on A. Carli Freres explicitly notes that no sources survive for other brothers or family members in open archives, because the Schaerbeek municipal archives were largely destroyed in a fire in 1911. That destruction is the primary reason why Egisto does not appear in the documented Belgian family tree.
The circumstantial case for a family connection is strong:
- Same distinctive surname (Carli) from the same small town (Bagni di Lucca)
- Same craft (plaster figure making)
- Same period of activity (the Bagni di Lucca figurinai emigration wave, late 19th to early 20th century)
- Egisto settled in London; Antonio went to Brussels. Splitting across different countries was a standard figurinai emigration pattern — siblings or cousins would go to different cities to maximise market coverage
- The French Wikipedia article notes the Schaerbeek archive fire means other family members cannot be excluded from the record
WHAT THE A.CARLI FRERES FIRM ACTUALLY PRODUCED
A. Carli Freres produced plaster and terracotta figures using serial production from moulds made by in-house modellers (“mouleurs en platre”). All plaster and terracotta pieces carry a serial number and typically the marking “MADE IN BELGIUM” (with “MADE IN” above and “BELGIUM” below).
Higher-quality works in marble and bronze used a polygonal marble base, characteristic of their premium line. The firm worked with known sculptors including Riccardo Aurili and Gustave Van Vaerenbergh. Pieces carry signatures: A. Carli (Antonio), G. Carli (most likely Giovanni Ornido), and Jean Carli (Guido’s personal name).
The company both produced its own designs and distributed work by independent sculptors under licence, including Salvatore Melani — the same Melani documented separately on chalkware.gallery.
The operational model — a Bagni di Lucca family running an industrial plaster production operation with salaried sculptors and serial production numbers — is directly analogous to what Egisto was doing in London under the BT registrations, albeit on a smaller scale.
BAGNI DI LUCCA: THE ORIGIN TOWN
The figurinai capital, Bagni di Lucca, a town in the mountain valleys about 30km north of Lucca, is one of the two primary centres of the figurinai tradition alongside Coreglia Antelminelli. Plaster figurine making there dates to at least the 14th century — a 1373 document in the Lucca archives mentions a “figuris gesso.” Mass emigration of figuristi began in the 18th century, with documented groups leaving in formal compagnie (companies of 6-15 men) under an experienced capo, travelling across Europe and eventually to the Americas and Australia.
In the period 1866-1873 alone, 592 figuristi emigrated from Bagni di Lucca, compared with 557 from Barga and 484 from Coreglia. England received figuristi from Bagni di Lucca from at least 1790, when Ambrose Pelligrini (from Barga, near Bagni di Lucca) was documented at 158 High Holborn. The National Portrait Gallery’s comprehensive database of British plaster figure makers and bronze founders records numerous Lucca-origin craftsmen active in London from the early 19th century onwards — all from the same valleys that produced Egisto Carli and the Schaerbeek Carlis.
WHAT THIS ALL MEANS FOR EGISTO
If Egisto was born in Bagni di Lucca around 1886 (consistent with the birth year calculation from his death age of 73 in March 1959), he would have been part of the generation whose fathers and uncles had already established figurinai businesses across Europe. The move to London — specifically to the St Pancras/Islington area that already had a substantial Italian plaster-worker community — was not a personal adventure. It was the continuation of a multigenerational pattern.
His marriage in Pancras in 1934 (to Ms. Rondi, another Italian-origin surname) and his death in Islington in 1959 at 73 together suggest he was in London for at least 25 years before his BT design registrations of January 1955, and likely much longer.
ADDRESS AND NEIGHBOURHOOD CONTEXT
The Pancras/King’s Cross/Islington cluster is separate from but adjacent to the primary Clerkenwell “Little Italy” centred on Saffron Hill and Farringdon Road. The Italian community in this broader zone was substantial and interconnected. Gray’s Inn Lane/Road was the base for numerous figurinai firms from the 1840s onwards: the Caproni family at 79 Gray’s Inn Lane from 1850, Cantoni at 100 Church Street Chelsea, and others. King’s Cross and St Pancras provided the transport infrastructure that connected these makers to markets nationally.
The Quattromini page notes that Egisto Carli was “just down the road” from 127 Caledonian Road N1. The Lohnberg/DURON address was 2 Ronalds Road, Holloway Road N5. Besagni was at 101 Caledonian Road N1. These are not random addresses — they map the dispersal of the Italian plaster-making community as it moved outward from Clerkenwell from the late 19th century into the N1 and N19 zones.
4b. The shared service agent: A.W.M. Faulkner & Co
Egisto Carli used the same BT design registration service address as the Lohnberg/DURON firm: A.W.M. Faulkner & Co., 14 Cursitor Street, Chancery Lane, London EC4. This is significant. Faulkner & Co. was a patent and design registration agent. The fact that Egisto used the same agent as the Lohnbergs is not evidence of a business relationship between them, but it does confirm that:
- Egisto was navigating the formal BT design registration system deliberately, not by accident
- He used professional agents — suggesting either sufficient business sophistication or a pre-existing introduction to the patent/design world
- The Faulkner & Co. practice served multiple Italian-origin chalkware makers, making it a community resource rather than an individual discovery
MRS RONDI: ANOTHER LUCCA LEAD
Egisto married “Ms. Rondi” in Pancras in March 1934. The Rondi surname is of northern Italian origin and is documented in Tuscany and Lombardy. It is not a common name but not rare in the Lucca/Garfagnana zone. The marriage in St Pancras district in 1934 places both parties in the Italian community in that area in the early 1930s. It looks like they had a child, Consiglia.
Given that Egisto was approximately 48 at marriage and Consiglia was born in June 1935 (so within the first year of marriage), this appears to be a mid-life marriage consistent with an immigrant who had spent years establishing himself in London before settling. Consiglia is an unusual Italian name (meaning “counsel” — from Consiglio) that would make her distinctively trackable in later electoral rolls. She would have been born approximately 1935, so if still living would be around 90. So I have some more work to do here!
THE NATIONAL PORTRAIT GALLERY RESOURCE: NOTABLE ABSENCE
The National Portrait Gallery (NPG) maintains a comprehensive online database of “British bronze sculpture founders and plaster figure makers, 1800-1980”. This resource covers Italian-origin figurinai in London from at least the 1790s through the 20th century in considerable detail — including all major Lucca-origin makers active in the Victorian and Edwardian periods.
Egisto Carli does not appear in this resource at all. This is itself informative: it confirms he was not operating as a sculptor’s moulder or art foundry in the traditional sense tracked by that database. His activity was specifically mid-century decorative chalkware under the 1949 Registered Designs Act, not the fine-art casting trade. He sits in a distinct commercial niche from the 19th-century figurinai tradition, even if his family origin connects him to it.
The NPG resource does document Ambrose Pelligrini (one of the first Lucca figurinai in London, from Barga near Bagni di Lucca, active 1790-1817), the Caproni family (from Barga, active 1841-1891), and Cantoni (from Italy, active 1889-1923). These are the London predecessors of the world Egisto worked in. By the 1950s the figurinai tradition had evolved from street-selling of religious figures to registered decorative manufacturing — Egisto is part of that transition.
AND THERE’S MORE
You can find the fascinating history of European chalkware here, please do check it out.
Click here for all mid-century Carli chalkware figurine pieces
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