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Key figures

Origin and history

The Neuilly-sur-Seine Automate Museum was a museum dedicated to mechanical automatons, inaugurated in 1978 in the former Arturo Lopez hotel (also known as the Rodocanachi hotel), a private hotel built in 1903 on the initiative of Paul Rodocanachi, an architectural enthusiast. The building, designed by architect Émile Danneron, inspired 18th-century hotels and welcomed artists such as Auguste Rodin, Henri Matisse or Ossip Zadkine. During the First World War, his commons served as accommodation for convalescent soldiers. The building is distinguished by its interior decorations (woodhouses, mirrors) and a ballroom covered with shells, the work of decorator Serge Royaux in 1956, recalling the cottage of the shells of the Château de Rambouillet.

In 1928, patron Arturo Lopez acquired the hotel to display furniture from royal residences. He made changes there between 1950 and 1958, where he received Salvador Dalí. When he died in 1962, the municipality of Neuilly-sur-Seine purchased the building in 1971 to make it a museum and cultural centre. The initial collection of 63 mechanical automatons (1850-1930), acquired in 1978, was supplemented by 6 additional pieces between 1993 and 1996. The museum, now closed, lost its label "Musée de France" in January 2025. Rehabilitation is planned from 2024 onwards to transform the hotel into a new cultural centre (media library, music studios, etc.).

The automatons exhibited illustrated the French production between 1850 and 1930, a pivotal period for mechanics and craftsmanship. Their collection reflected both a technical heritage and an artistic heritage, linked to the history of the hotel and its successive owners. Although the museum is no longer permanently accessible, temporary exhibitions still make it possible to admire these pieces, witnesses to a lost know-how.

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