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Heritage classified

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Origin and history

The Hotel de la Caisse d'Epargne de Nevers, built in the first quarter of the 20th century, is part of an ambitious project launched in 1912 by Frédéric Blandin, chairman of the board of directors. The neo-Gothic building is erected at the corner of Carnot Square and St. Martin Street, with a prominent staircase turret. Its slender roofs willfully recall the silhouette of the neighbouring Ducal Palace, while its facades, richly decorated with bays, gables and skylights, house allegorical sculptures by Alix Marquet. The latter illustrate the virtues of saving (such as The Work) and the vices of prodigality (e.g.: The Avarice), through chimeral human and animal figures.

The construction, entrusted to the Niverese architect Auguste Palet, began in 1914 but was interrupted by the First World War. The inauguration took place only in 1921, although the work was not fully completed. The iconographic programme, designed by Blandin and directed by Marquet, aims to promote the moral values related to savings, as evidenced by the great bas-relief Le Travail, its management, saving, the future. The building, renovated in the 1980s, has its interior radically changed, with the exception of the council room on the first floor, preserved with its original decoration.

Ranked among the Historical Monuments, the hotel stands out for its atypical architectural style for a banking institution. The protected elements include facades, roofs, the gate of the passage to the courtyard, the old open passage on the ground floor, and the council room. The building, later enlarged by a court building respecting its style, remains a significant testimony of the neo-Gothic art applied to a civic and moralizing program.

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