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Origin and history

The Pincé Hotel, located on Lenepveu Street in Angers, is a Renaissance building built between 1528 and 1535 by architect Jean Delespine for Jean de Pincé, then mayor of Angers. Ranked as a historical monument in 1875, it illustrates the civil architecture of the Renaissance, with its tuffed facades, sculpted dormers and its spiral staircase. The hotel, originally designed as a private residence, was acquired in 1861 by painter Guillaume Bodinier to make it a municipal museum.

The Pincé Museum, inaugurated in 1889, presents collections of Greek, Roman, Egyptian and Chinese and Japanese antiques, from prestigious gifts such as those of Turpin de Crissé or Count of Saint-Genys. Closed in 2005 for renovation, it reopens in 2020 with a modern museography, including digital and olfactory devices. Since 2023, his temporary exhibitions have explored cross-cutting themes, such as sea, seduction or colour, while highlighting the Léveilley donation.

The Pincé hotel is distinguished by its square plan, its preserved interior decorations (voûts, carved ceilings) and its complex architectural history. Several times, notably by Lucien Magne at the end of the 19th century, he lost his original attic floor. Today owned by the city of Angers, there remains a major testimony of patronage and taste for Renaissance arts, while playing a contemporary cultural role.

The museum's collections, organized by geographical area, cover 6,000 years of history, from Greek ceramics to Japanese masks. Donors from the 19th and 20th centuries, such as Edouard Moll or Le Bault de la Morinière, have enriched his funds. Since 2020, the museum has been offering an immersive approach, with digital tools to contextualize works and temporary exhibitions that cross the collections of the Angers museums.

Future

Today, the Pincé house houses in its walls a museum rich in art collections, called the "Pince Museum". The visitor discovers the richness and beauty of civilizations: Greek, Roman and Egyptian antiques, Japanese art and Chinese art. (Japanese prints, bronzes and Chinese ceramics).

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