Timeline

Heritage classified

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Origin and history

The house located at 31 rue Briçonnet in Tours, in the department of Indre-et-Loire, is one of the few 13th century civilian buildings still preserved in the city. Its eastern facade, decorated with five arches in third-point, illustrates medieval Tourangelle architecture. It was enlarged in the 14th century, then separated from its neighbour in the 15th century, with a western façade redone at that time. The restorations of the 1970s allowed to preserve its original elements, including a vaulted room at a dogive cross and an interior staircase.

Classified as a historic monument in 1965, this house could have been a dependency of the former church of Saint-Pierre-le-Puellier, located opposite. Its ground floor may have housed the capitular hall, while its storeys and attices rise over vast cellars. The upper façade, rebuilt in the 17th century, probably replaces arches destroyed by fire or collapse. Corinthian capitals and sculpted lamp-butts of chimera testify to its medieval decor.

Rue Briçonnet, a medieval road linking the Basilica of Saint Martin to the Loire, places this building in the heart of the Old Towers. Its restoration allowed to restore its gable and highlight its protected elements: facades, roofs, vaulted room and staircase. Today, it embodies the rare civil heritage of this period in the Centre-Val de Loire region.

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