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Origin and history

The hotel of Rohan-Montbazon is a mansion built in 1719 by architect Pierre Cailleteau, dit Laassurance, on the plans of Jean-Michel Chevotet, for Louise-Julie de La Tour d'Auvergne, princess of Montbazon. A widow of Prince François-Armand de Rohan-Guéméné, she chose this neighborhood close to her brother, the Earl of Évreux, owner of the present palace of the Elysée. When he died in 1750, the hotel was acquired by the financier Jean-Marie Richard, who added a wing housing a chapel and kitchens, criticized by the architect Jacques-François Blondel for his lack of harmony.

In 1792, the hotel was sold to Marie-Madeleine Victoire Thomas, widow of Louis-Hyacinthe Raymond de Saint-Sauveur, who arranged the large living room in the First Empire style. After his death in 1817, the building came into the hands of several owners, including the collector Augustin de Lapeyrière (1819) and Count Alexandre César de La Panouse (1823). In 1876 his son, César Armand, undertook a partial reconstruction, raising the housing body to three levels and changing the façade on the street.

In the 20th century, the hotel temporarily housed the workshop of the dressmaker Gabrielle Chanel, which received personalities like Igor Stravinsky or Pablo Picasso. Since then, it has been transformed into a private condominium, including a law firm. Only the Premier Empire Salon, which was listed as a historical monument in 1927, now bears witness to its past prestige.

A citizen of the Pillet-Will hotel (residence of the Ambassador of Japan), the Rohan-Montbazon hotel embodies the architectural and social changes of an aristocratic neighbourhood, marked by the fascists of the Old Regime, the Haussmannian transformations and the social life of the 19th century.

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