Timeline

Heritage classified

Key figures

Origin and history

The castle of Arry, located in the municipality of the same name in Moselle (Great East), was erected in the first half of the eighteenth century on the bases of an old strong house. Acquisé circa 1707 by Louis Charpentier, an anoblished in 1714 as Grand Gruyer de Lorraine, he embodied an ambitious architectural project: a central body framed by two square pavilions and deployed wings, all crowned with a broken frame. The gardens, organized in three terraces, were probably designed by the same architect, mixing masonry and plant perspectives.

On the death of Louis Charpentier in 1743, his son Pierre, president of Metz's parliament, continued the development. His wife, Anne-Agathe, passionate about botany, enriched the gardens with rare plants, cited in 1769 by doctor Buchoz. Sold in 1818 to Baron Jacquinot, the estate retained its 18th-century structures in the upper parts, while the low terraces were redesigned in a picturesque style, with a reworked waterfall and exotic essences.

The castle, rented as a holiday colony from 1930, was completely destroyed in 1944 during the Second World War. Today only the classified gardens (1996 and 1998), with their Louis XV stairs, basins, and canal fed by a waterfall. The property now belongs to the Fédération familles de France de Moselle, which operates a leisure centre there.

Among the protected elements are the Louis XV X-style stairway, a three-archived portal bridge, and terrace walls structuring French-style gardens. The site also pays tribute to Albert de Seguin de Reyniès, a resistant man born in 1900, whose name appears on the monument to the local dead.

The gardens, registered and classified as historical monuments, illustrate the evolution of landscape tastes, from 18th-century classicism to 19th-century naturalism. Their terraced layout, centred on a central staircase and a canal, reflects a sophisticated architectural and hydraulic design, rare in the region.

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