Timeline

Heritage classified

Key figures

Origin and history

The house of Richelieu, built in the seventeenth century and redesigned in the eighteenth century, is part of the ambitious urban project launched by Cardinal Richelieu. The latter transformed his native village into an ideal city, designed by architect Jacques Lemercier, with symmetrical streets, ditches and aligned houses. The private hotel, erected in 1633 or 1634 for Claude Malier, Sieur de Houssay, intendant of finance, illustrates this rigorous planning. Its four core staircase, mentioned in a market of 1634, and its partially visible structure on a drawing of the same year, testify to the architectural techniques of the period.

The building combines original elements and subsequent modifications, such as the modern staircase replaced by the porch. The attic preserves a straight wooden flight with balusters, typical of the ramp stairs of the seventeenth century. The cellar, accessible under the porch, and the facades protected by decrees of 1932 and 2004 underline its heritage importance. However, doubts remain about the authenticity of Barbet's design and the exact location of the plots, reflecting the challenges of historical documentation.

The construction context reveals the links between political power and architecture: Claude Malier, close to the cardinal, embodies the administrative elite that benefited from this urban project. The house, with its crossing porch and inner courtyard, met the residential and representative needs of the senior officials of the Ancien Régime. Its inscription as a Historic Monument in 1932, then in 2004, confirms its value as a witness to the rich town planning and the art of living in the seventeenth century.

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