Usine Delattre
Monument
Usine Delattre, located in Roubaix (Nord), is a medieval landmark built in the Middle Ages. The monument is currently closed to visitors.
Key facts
- Type
- autre
- Period
- Medieval (11th-15th century)
- Location
- Roubaix, Nord, Hauts-de-France
- Visit
- Closed to visitors
- GPS
- 50.6891, 3.1712
- Mérimée Reference
- PA59000016
An industrial jewel of 19th-century Roubaix, the Delattre factory's well-ordered brick facades stand like a manifesto of the first textile era, and it is one of the oldest factories still standing in the Lille area.
History
In the heart of Roubaix, a town that was once dubbed the "French Manchester", the Delattre factory stands out as one of the last architectural witnesses to the industrial golden age of the North of France. Listed as a Historic Monument since 1998, it embodies the ambition and rigour that forged the textile fortunes of the Roubaix basin in the 19th century. Its solid proportions and russet brick give it a quiet dignity, a far cry from the gigantic factories that followed. What makes the Delattre factory truly unique is its ability to condense into a single building the intimate history of an entrepreneurial family and the collective epic of a working-class town. The building lacks the ostentatious magnificence of bourgeois châteaux, but has a functional and honest beauty: rhythmic arcatures on the ground floor, a prominent cornice crowning the whole, carefully proportioned windows despite the scars of the First World War. This is the architecture of those who made it, not those who looked at it. For visitors with a passion for industrial heritage, walking around the enclosure bounded by Rue du Nord, Rue du Curoir and Rue de Sébastopol is like walking through almost two centuries of economic and social history. You can make out the weaving looms, the noise of the shuttles and the steam rising from the boilers. The Delattre factory is in natural dialogue with Roubaix's other heritage treasures - the Condition Publique and the Piscine museum - as part of a journey of rediscovery of a city in the midst of a cultural renaissance. The dense urban environment surrounding the building, far from detracting from its interest, reinforces its authenticity. This is not a reconstructed museum, but a living fragment of the city as it was built, alleyway by alleyway, workshop by workshop, to the rhythm of handlooms and steam engines. In this changing district, the Delattre factory remains a precious memorial for a community that draws from its industrial past the resources for its renewal.
Architecture
The Delattre factory is part of the rational industrial architecture typical of the second quarter of the 19th century in northern France. Its layout is based on a regular quadrilateral, the sides of which face onto the Rue du Nord, the Rue du Curoir and the Rue de Sébastopol respectively, a typical layout for urban factories in Roubaix that blends in with the existing plot rather than obliterating it. The entire complex is built in brick, the material of choice for northern builders for both economic reasons - the Flemish subsoil is rich in clay - and climatic reasons. The façades are the building's main architectural feature. Their rigorous layout reflects architect Achille Dewarlez's determination to impose a classical compositional logic on a programme that was nonetheless functional. The ground floor is punctuated by a series of semi-circular arches that give rhythmic structure to the bays and introduce a graphic lightness into the mass of brickwork. The upper floor is pierced by windows - now partly blocked up, visible traces of successive alterations and war damage - whose proportions betray the concern for natural lighting typical of spinning mills. The whole structure is topped by a projecting cornice that clearly marks the boundary between the building and the sky, giving the factory a firm, legible silhouette. The interior of the factory was designed to meet the technical requirements of textile production: large, unobstructed floor areas, long spans supported by rows of cast-iron or wooden columns, and roofs with traditional frameworks allowing for overhead lighting. These characteristics, common to textile factories of the period, make the Delattre factory a representative, if not exceptional, example of the industrial architectural vocabulary of 19th-century northern France.
Related Figures
Henri Delattre — fondateur de la filature en 1832, entrepreneur textile pionnier de la première industrialisation roubaisienneAchille Dewarlez — architecte concepteur de l'usine en 1840, figure de l'architecture industrielle et civile du Roubaix du XIXe siècleLes ouvriers et ouvrières de la filature — acteurs anonymes mais indispensables de l'épopée textile roubaisienne, dont l'usine Delattre demeure le témoignage bâti
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Frequently Asked Questions
Where is Usine Delattre located?
Usine Delattre is located in Roubaix, Nord department, Hauts-de-France region, France.
When was Usine Delattre built?
Usine Delattre dates back to a period built in the Middle Ages (11th-15th century).
Is Usine Delattre open to visitors?
Usine Delattre is currently closed to visitors.