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Origin and history

La gentilhommière de la Meslerie is a castle located in Saint-Julien-de-Concelles, in the Loire-Atlantique department, in the Pays de la Loire region. Built in 1820, it illustrates the neo-Greek style, characteristic of the bourgeois residences of the Nantes region, with a circular living room and a sober facade with ancient influences. The estate opens on the road of the Meuniers (D 374) and includes an earlier chapel, dated 1701, dedicated to Saint Catherine, partially damaged during the French Revolution.

Originally, the land of Mesleria belonged to the lord of Saint-Julien, Damien de Chandenier, who planned to build a summer pavilion there before emigrating during the Revolution. In 1758 Jean Gabriel Cheguillaume, a Nantes bourgeois, bought the estate and completed the reconstruction in 1820, modifying the original project. The site then passes into the hands of the families of Mercy, Castonnet, Guille des Buttes, and then Gérald Van der Kemp, who sold it in 1929 with regret, nicknamed it "the child of Mesleria".

The architecture, due to the influence of François-Léonard Seheult, is distinguished by doric half-columns and ionic pilasters, without a pediment. The property also includes two symmetrical barns, an old gate leading back to the Loroux-Bottereau, and a chapel at the Lavallois altarpiece in stucco and marble, stripped of its statues and altar painting during the Revolution. Almost the entire estate is now listed or listed in the Inventory of Historic Monuments.

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