Which French glassmaker founded the School of Nancy?

Émile Gallé founded the School of Nancy, known in French as the École de Nancy, in 1901.

Gallé was a French glassmaker, designer, ceramicist, and furniture maker from Nancy. He helped turn the city into a major center of Art Nouveau, drawing on flowers, plants, insects, and other natural forms for both decoration and symbolism. The movement was formally organized as the Alliance Provinciale des Industries d’Art, with Gallé writing its statutes and serving as its first president.

The School of Nancy was broader than a glassmaking workshop. It brought together artists and makers working in glass, furniture, ceramics, stained glass, metalwork, and architecture. Important figures associated with it included Louis Majorelle, Antonin Daum, Victor Prouvé, and Eugène Vallin.

A common mix-up is confusing Gallé with René Lalique or Louis Comfort Tiffany, both major Art Nouveau glass designers but not founders of the Nancy movement. Gallé died in 1904, but the organization continued to shape the city’s artistic identity.