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Origin and history

Lagarde Castle, located in Grateloup-Saint-Gayrand, New Aquitaine, was built in two major phases: the first half of the seventeenth century and a restoration in the middle of the nineteenth century. It occupies a terrace on a gentle slope towards the brook du Rose, surrounded by a ditch that isolates the buildings organized around a closed courtyard. The central housing body, made of brick and stone, is flanked by two small wings and commons (housings, stables, pigeons) connected by a wall once crenelated. A fountain dated 1630, fed by a vaulted reservoir, bears witness to the water supply of the time. The set, covered with flat or hollow tiles depending on the parts, combines summary defensive elements and residential architecture.

The castle was erected in 1624 by Jacques de Bruet, Protestant lord of Lagarde and former governor of Tonneins (1604–22), after permission from his suzerain. An inscription on the fountain confirms the completion of the works around 1630 (‘Noble Jacques de Bruet [...] made these fountains bastir'). The estate then passed to the family of Grossolles de Flamarens in 1722 and was acquired after the Revolution by M. de Gelas. In 1847, the Bordeaux merchant Martin Flouch bought it and undertook a major restoration between 1852 and 1853, led by architect A. Lamothe. The cadastre of 1832 revealed a ruined north wing, while a cellar and a cudier were added in 1876. The adjacent mill on the Rose was restored at the end of the 19th century.

Ranked Historic Monument in 1996 (amended in 2011), the castle protects its facades, roofs, fence walls, ditches and fountain. Private property, it illustrates the evolution of a Protestant seigneurial residence as a bourgeois agricultural residence, marked by modernization campaigns in the 18th and 19th centuries. Materials (brick, turf) and hydraulics reflect local techniques, while 19th century transformations are part of the romantic taste for neo-medieval restorations.

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