Immeuble
MonumentHidden Treasure
Immeuble, located in Morlaix (Département 29), is a Renaissance château built in the 16th century. The monument is currently closed to visitors.
Key facts
- Type
- autre
- Period
- Renaissance (16th century)
- Location
- Morlaix, Département 29, Bretagne
- Visit
- Closed to visitors
- GPS
- 48.5788, -3.8278
- Mérimée Reference
- PA00090132
In the heart of Morlaix, this 16th-century dwelling houses a wooden staircase of rare poetry: its naive sculptures combining Gothic scrolls and Renaissance volutes make it a masterpiece of medieval transition.
History
Nestling in the urban fabric of Morlaix, one of Brittany's most heritage-rich towns, this 16th-century residence is almost invisible from the street. But it's inside that the main feature is revealed: an extraordinarily inventive carved wooden staircase that transforms the climb to the top floor into a veritable artistic journey. What fundamentally sets this building apart from its Breton contemporaries is the very nature of its interior decoration. Whereas most bourgeois homes of the time were content with a neat frame or quality furnishings, the anonymous craftsman who worked here covered every wooden surface with an abundant interweaving of plant motifs: climbing ivy, bunches of vines bursting with promise, starry rosettes, scrolls coiling with an almost organic freedom. The formal language hesitates deliciously between two worlds - the late Gothic and the nascent Renaissance - as if the artist had wanted to freeze in wood the exact moment of the shift from one aesthetic to another. The visitor's experience is one of surprise and intimacy. You enter a domestic space on a human scale, without the grandiloquence of castles or the austerity of religious buildings. The staircase runs from the entrance door to the roof timbers and crossbeams, creating a rare decorative continuity. The highlight of the tour is undoubtedly the landing post: here the craftsman has painstakingly reproduced the tower and bell tower of Saint-Mélaine church, a landmark in Morlaix, and incorporated the saint's face as a hand-hold - a picturesque touch that testifies to the deep attachment of this district to its parish life. The general framework of the visit is part of the discovery of Morlaix, a town of cobbled streets and half-timbered houses known as "lantern houses". This anonymous dwelling, with no flashy signs, is one of those discreet treasures that only curious walkers can unearth, far from the beaten track.
Architecture
The building belongs to the category of 16th-century Breton urban dwellings, built to a compact plan adapted to the narrow plots in the centre of Morlaix. The facade, sober and characteristic of the region's civil architecture, is probably built of granite masonry - the dominant stone in the whole of Armorican Brittany - with, according to local custom, carefully carved window surrounds. The steeply pitched roof, in keeping with the Breton tradition of being exposed to the Atlantic rains, completes a discreet silhouette that in no way suggests the richness of the interior. The wooden staircase is the architectural and decorative centrepiece of the complex. Developed from the entrance door all the way up to the roof frame, it forms a continuous ornamental programme of a rare ambition in the domestic sphere. The stringboards, posts, crossbeams and puncheons are covered with a repertoire of plant motifs sculpted in half-relief: soft scrolls, scrolled volutes, leaves and bunches of vines, and interlaced rosettes. The technical mastery is clear - the connections between the elements are fluid, the motifs are not repeated mechanically but vary with an inventive freedom that evokes the improvisation of the craftsman rather than the rigour of academic preparatory drawing. The landing post, with its architectural representation of the church of Saint-Mélaine and its handrest in the shape of the saint's face, adds a unique narrative and topographical dimension to this ensemble, transforming a functional object into a veritable monument within a monument.
Related Figures
Artisan sculpteur sur bois anonyme (XVIe siècle) — auteur de l'escalier sculptéSaint Mélaine (évêque de Rennes, Ve siècle) — figure dévotionnelle représentée sur le poteau de palierCommanditaire bourgeois anonyme (probable négociant ou armateur morlaisien, XVIe siècle)
Tags
Frequently Asked Questions
Where is Immeuble located?
Immeuble is located in Morlaix, Département 29 department, Bretagne region, France.
When was Immeuble built?
Immeuble dates back to a period built during the Renaissance (16th century).
Is Immeuble open to visitors?
Immeuble is currently closed to visitors.