Timeline

Heritage classified

Key figures

Origin and history

On 21 June 1723 a fire ravaged Châteaudun, destroying more than a thousand houses. This disaster marked a turning point in the city's urban history. Jules Hardouin, then building controller, was responsible for reconstruction. He designed a chessboard plan centered on a large public square, surrounded by regular buildings and arcade shops. This project aimed to modernize the city according to the principles of 18th-century classical urban planning, with rigorous symmetry and geometrical alignments.

The square, rectangular in shape, was to accommodate four large projecting buildings, higher than the nearby houses. Two of them were built on the back of the square, including the stone town hall erected in 1777. The two pavilions on the other side never came into being and were replaced in the 20th century by a post office hotel (1900). The facades and roofs overlooking the square, returning to Gambetta Street, were protected by a registration order in 1953, highlighting their heritage value.

The 18th Place du 18-October building illustrates this ambitious urban project. Its architecture reflects the aesthetic and functional choices of the era: regularity of facades, harmony of proportions, and integration into a coherent set. The square, now named Place du 18-October, remains a remarkable example of the urbanisation of the Enlightenment in the Centre-Val de Loire region, although some initial elements were not realized.

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