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Origin and history

The Alambic Museum - Écomusée du Hameau de Pirelonge is an outdoor museum inspired by Scandinavian models, located in the rural commune of Saint-Romain-de-Benet, Charente-Maritime. This site, composed of five former farms belonging to the same family of winemakers and distillers since 1750, was built in 1987 to revive the rural Saintonge, its architecture and its traditions. The ecomuseum showcases ancestral know-how, including the manufacture of cognac and essential oils, while offering an educational approach to agricultural practices that are endangered.

The ecomuseum is structured around four main themes: the stills museum (dedicated to cognac and pineau), the lavender museum (with a scent path and a perfume workshop), the printing and paper museum (with about 100 functional presses), and the weaving museum (with gold and silver thread embroidery). These collections are distributed in four traditional Saintongese houses, connected by paths lined with aromatic plants, offering an immersion in rural life of the past.

This lively museum offers seasonal demonstrations, such as the distillation of cognac (December to March) and lavender (late July to early August), as well as rural festivals celebrating harvests, traditional crafts (vanier, printer, potter) and local heritage. Inspired by models such as the Skansen Museum in Stockholm, the ecomuseum combines heritage preservation, cultural animation and the transmission of know-how, while remaining unknown despite its wealth and accessibility all year round.

Located between Saintes and Royan, near the RN 150, the Hameau de Pirelonge is positioned as a place to discover Saintongese traditions, mixing living history, pedagogy and rural tourism. Its aim is to perpetuate lost or threatened trades, such as artisanal distillation, weaving or old printing, while keeping in a natural and architectural setting preserved since the 18th century.

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