When I returned to Paris several months ago, during the second Covid lockdown, I kept myself entertained by trying to see the city of my birth through new eyes, scouting out lesser-known corners and hidden places I had never visited before. It was during this roving exercise that I was introduced to Guillaume Féau, heir to the 150-year-old interior woodworking firm Féau Boiseries, acquired by his family in the 1950s and today regarded as one of the most important historical purveyors of its kind, among the last of a breed of French decorative specialists.