Timeline

Heritage classified

Key figures

Origin and history

The Domaine des Colombières, located in Menton in the Alpes-Maritimes, is a property classified as a historical monument, acquired in 1903 by philosopher Alfred Fouillée, who built a house there for health reasons. This initial core became the heart of the future villa, located on the heights of Garavan, overlooking the bay and close to the Italian border.

In 1918, Émile and Caroline Ladan-Bockairy bought the estate and entrusted their friend Ferdinand Bac, a versatile artist, with the mission of renovating the villa and developing the gardens between 1920 and 1932. Bac, inspired by Mediterranean cultures, merges ancient elements (columns, statues, Latin inscriptions) and travel memories, creating a unique artistic synthesis. The villa, enlarged by two wings, and the 3.5-hectare gardens, enriched with factories and a thousand-year-old carob tree, embody this vision.

During the Second World War, the estate was requisitioned by the Italian army as a convalescence center, which severely degraded the property. After the war, Caroline Ladan-Bockairy returned until her death in 1957. The estate, transformed into a hotel and then guest rooms, was restored between 1995 and 2000 by Michael and Margaret Likierman. Ranked in 1991, he kept an empty mausoleum for Émile Ladan-Bockairy and Ferdinand Bac, who died in Compiègne in 1952.

The gardens and villa reflect Bac's heritage, mixing pumpkin architecture (red coats, colonnade), symbolic elements (obelisk, bas-reliefs) and Mediterranean vegetation. The original house of 1903, rectangular and on three levels, was transformed by Bac, who modified the openings and redeveloped the interiors to harmonize the whole with his aesthetic and historical project.

The field illustrates an ambitious artistic approach: to avoid an archaeological reconstruction to extract the timeless essence of Mediterranean cultures. Bac describes his method as a "synthesis" of the stripped forms of their precise historical contexts, uniting Greek, Roman and Eastern influences under the same climate and sea. This approach makes the Colombières his most accomplished work.

Today, the domain remains an exceptional testimony of the eclecticism of the early twentieth century, where art, history and nature dialogue. Its classification in 1991 protects all buildings, their decoration, gardens and their statuary elements, thus preserving the original vision of Ferdinand Bac and his patrons, the Ladan-Bockairy.

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