• Architect Jacques Gabriel, 1667
• Architect Ange - Jacques Gabriel, 1698

His mother was a cousin of Jules Hardouin - Mansart and his father, another Jacques Gabriel was a masonry contractor for the Bâtiments du Roi, the French royal works, and the designer of the Château de Choisy for the king's cousin, La Grande Mademoiselle.

The younger Jacques Gabriel was appointed one of the controlleurs généraux at the Bâtiments du Roi in 1688, at the age of twenty - one. Two years later he was sent to accompany Robert de Cotte on an eighteen month sojourn in Italy, sharpening his eye, and on his return was made one of the Autres Architectes in the Bâtiments du Roi, where he proved an efficient administrator. He was made a member of the Académie at Mansart's reorganization of that body in 1699.

Pierre - Jean Mariette, who knew him well says that he was "expert in the conduct of building, but he could not have drawn the least jot of ornament" For designers of ornament, Gabriel relied on Pierre Lepautre and after Lepautre's death, on Jean Aubert, another designer trained in the Bâtiments du Roi.

Gabriel succeeded Robert de Cotte as Premier Architecte du Roi at de Cotte's retirement in December 1734 and held the post until he was succeeded by his "vastly more gifted" son, Ange - Jacques Gabriel in 1742.

Gabriel's work in Paris has been much remodeled. Mariette's Architecture françoise offers plates illustrating several hôtels particuliers by Gabriel. He completed the Palais Bourbon (begun by Giardini, continued by Pierre Cailleteau Lassurance). He completed the Hôtel de Lassay nearby. He was responsible for the Hôtel Peyrenc de Moras (de Biron), 1728 - 31.

Born to a Parisian family of architects and initially trained by the royal architect Robert de Cotte and his father (who died in 1742), whom he assisted in the creation of the Place Royale (now Place de la Bourse) at Bordeaux (completed in 1735), the younger Gabriel was made a member of the Académie royale d'architecture in 1728. He was the principal assistant to his father as Premier Architecte at Versailles from 1735 and succeeded him in the position in 1742, essentially making him the premier architect of France, a role he retained for most of the reign of Louis XV.

Gabriel's symmetrical palace like façades for the hôtels particuliers that enclose the north side of the Place Louis XV (Place de la Concorde), Paris, were begun in 1754 and completed in 1763. That on the right housed the storerooms for the royal furnishings (mobilier de la couronne), with luxurious apartments for the intendant; it has housed the naval ministry since the court returned from Versailles in 1789.

Gabriel's sober rationality in planning and detail promoted the transition from Rococo to Neoclassicism. For forty years, Gabriel supplied all designs not only for exterior construction (the "Gabriel Wing" at Versailles was named for him in modern times) and also for the constant remodeling of interiors at Versailles. His Petit Trianon at Versailles is one of the gems of French Classicism.

Gabriel died in Paris in 1782.