
Louis Majorelle was a French art nouveau furniture designer. He lived in Nancy and had a large factory with over 100 workers. He was a bit of an economic hero, employing so many people and his work was sold throughout Europe.
Majorelle did production work and one-of-a-kind art furniture as well. Most of his designs used marquetry decoration as well as carving.
Here is a photo from around 1900 of the marquetry workshop. The men seated on the left are using a saw called the chevalet. This tool allowed the cutter to saw packets of veneer that would ultimately be assembled in jigsaw-like pictures. The chevalet was an efficient tool for getting multiples.
The man on the right is overseeing the workshop and presumably selecting the veneers for the individual pictures.