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Origin and history

The Château de Lacoste, also known as the Château du Marquis de Sade, is a medieval building built in the 11th century on a hill north of the Luberon, in the village of Lacoste (Vaucluse). Its strategic position offers stunning views of the Calavon Valley, the Vaucluse Mountains and Mount Ventoux. Originally owned by the Simiane family, it was profoundly transformed over the centuries before becoming emblematic thanks to its last owner, the Marquis de Sade.

The castle changed hands between the Simianes and the Sades by two hypotheses: either in 1627, when Diane Simiane married Jean-Baptiste de Sade, or in 1716, when Isabelle Simiane bequeathed him to Gaspard François de Sade. The Marquis de Sade stayed there several times, notably between 1769 and 1772, where he had a 120-seat theatre built. He took refuge there after scandals, such as Marseilles, before being imprisoned in Vincennes in 1777.

During the French Revolution, the castle was vandalized and destroyed in September 1792, its resold materials. Sade, then in Paris, expressed his despair in a letter: "What a loss! She's above the expression. " In 1796 he sold the ruins to Rovere, MP for Vaucluse, who died deported to Guyana in 1798. The estate then passed into several hands, including that of a carpenter in 1816, before being bought in 1952 by André Bouer, who began his restoration.

In 1992, the castle was listed as historical monuments. In 2001, Pierre Cardin acquired and launched the Festival de Lacoste, combining lyrical art and theatre in adjacent careers. He also undertook restoration work and in 2020 created the Festival du Cinéma de Lacoste. When he died in 2020, his nephew Rodrigo Basilicati Cardin inherited the castle, plunged into a judicial battle in 2023.

The Marquis de Sade immortalized this castle in his works, such as La Marquise de Gange (1813) and Les One Hundred Twenty Days of Sodom, under the name of Silling Castle. Today, its ruins and its sulphurous history make it a major cultural place in Provence, linked to both medieval heritage and literary memory.

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