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Heritage classified

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Origin and history

The Natural History Museum of La Rochelle is housed in the former palace of the governor of Aunis, a mansion built between 1708 and 1718 for Jouin de la Tremblay by the engineer Claude Masse. This building, which became the governors' residence in 1748, was enlarged in 1775 by architects Nicolas Marie Potain and Julien Nassivet, with two wings dedicated to outbuildings and stables. The town of La Rochelle acquired it to install a public library in 1808, by decision of Napoleon I.

In 1832, the left wing was redeveloped to accommodate the collections of natural history left in 1782 by Clement de la Faille, forming the "Lafaille museum". In 1852, Louis-Benjamin Fleuriau of Bellevue added his own collections, creating the "Museum Fleuriau". The building then served as a bishopric from 1874 to 1903, before being bought by the city in 1910 to expand the museums and botanical garden. A major restoration between 1998 and 2007 doubled the exposure area.

The collections, among the richest in France, cover natural history (zoology, paleontology, geology) and ethnography, with pieces from military campaigns, slave trade or religious missions. Lafaille, restored in its original coral red colour, is the country's oldest natural history cabinet. The museum also houses 45,000 books in its specialized library.

Ranked a historic monument in 2003, the museum is now involved in the Anada project (2023-2027), funded by the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region, to inventory and contextualize its 5,500 pieces of sub-Saharan origin. Some could be subject to refunds, such as the Maori head returned to New Zealand in 2012.

The plant garden, adjacent to the museum, completes the whole with botanical species and a dolmen. The architecture combines 18th and 19th century styles, reflecting the successive transformations of the building, from the mansion to the contemporary museum space.

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