Timeline

Heritage classified

Key figures

Origin and history

Mirabel-Laval Castle is located on a terrace overlooking the countryside, with a park and a boxyard to the south. Its quadrilateral organization, typical of the early seventeenth century, includes a main house body, commons in U, a chapel in the east and old kitchens in the west. Two square towers with pyramidal roofs frame the southern facade, while octagonal towers mark the corners. The facades, partially redesigned around 1918-1919, retain architectural elements such as accolade pediments and terracotta fruit pots.

The castle originates in a house named En Vaylet (or Laval), mentioned at the end of the 18th century on the map of Cassini. In 1709, Pierre Devoisins (1683-1760), a bourgeois of Lavaur and a lawyer in parliament, acquired the estate and continued the work initiated in the 17th century. He became a capitoul in 1749 and helped shape the building, which appeared on the Napoleonic cadastre of 1826 under the property of the heirs of Guillaume Devoisins de Mirabel. The facades and roofs were listed as Historic Monuments in 1990.

The massé plan of the castle, with its outbuildings (orangerie, stables, sheds) and its three arcade gates, reflects a remarkable architectural harmony. The toponym Mirabel-Laval evokes its evolution from a simple house to a seigneurial estate, illustrating the social ascent of its owners. The accuracy of its location is considered satisfactory (note 7/10), with an address confirmed in Lavaur (Tarn, Occitanie).

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