A 1910 illustration by Pierre Legrain for Louis Vuitton

Photo: Courtesy of Louis Vuitton Malletier

In the early 1920s, Gaston-Louis Vuitton, the third generation to helm his family’s French luxury brand, was deeply enmeshed in the emergent design style of the moment, Art Deco . As such, he began collaborating with Pierre Legrain, one of the movement’s most promising young talents—an illustrator, designer, and bookbinder. The artist’s delicate linework would soon appear as imagery for advertisements. Then in 1921, at Vuitton’s request, he crafted the label’s first furniture edition, a lacquered wood dressing table that debuted at the Salon des Artistes Décorateurs in Paris that year.…