Château de Fleyriat

English translation

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History

The château appears partially on plans from 1747. In 1794, a first agricultural estate develops, of which the 1830 cadastre gives a general picture: square house erected from the end of the 18th century then gradually up to 1811; creation of a major axis with the establishment of a gate bordered by stables on the right and a covered wall on the left. In 1803, construction of the orangery. In 1862, the descendant of the baron de Bohan acquires an adjoining plot and has a small country château built there, surrounded by a park in the English style, by architect Edouard Corroyer. The approach is that of the neo-Renaissance style. A pupil of Viollet-le-Duc, the architect designs down to the details of the interior decoration. The park, planned by Corroyer and realized by landscape gardener Derussy, is characteristic of parks of this period, with an arrangement in petals, attention paid to topography and the picturesque, use of water to create a small island accessible by a footbridge and the planting of varied species.

Description

The estate as proposed for protection is composed of two distinct parts, connected to each other by the landscaped layout of the park: On one side, the farm and horticultural-agricultural installations, the oldest part of the estate. Access from the communal road is via the so-called 'Chinese' gateway, already shown on the 1811 plan. In line with this, there is the 'square house', datable to the end of the 18th century. Its irregular elevation as well as the blind façade, like anomalies in the roof structure, indicate that the building was probably altered at an unknown date, probably before 1811, the date when the attached barn, present on the 1795 plan, disappeared. On either side and at the rear are the outbuildings: on the right, a covered wall allowing for storage of machinery (at the rear) and accommodating vines trained on the central garden. Facing this, the stables, probably built, like the orangery, at the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries. It is a quadrangular building in rubble stone with render and tile roof, whose elevation has been pierced several times. It nevertheless accommodates a tack room and a stable whose fittings could date from the original period (Loubat de Bohan was interested in horses). Two pedestrian doors arranged symmetrically present an alternation of limestone and brick and provide, for interior lighting, a rounded and glazed transom. The one leading to the stable is surmounted by a cast iron horse head. At the far end, a wash house is constructed at the location of the 'fountain' mentioned on the 1795 plan. Behind the 'square house', built against the wall of the outbuildings overlooking the farmyard, is the orangery, built in 1803 (dating by source) in neoclassical style. Its construction, substantially exceeding the building height, is monumentalized by the vocabulary of architecture used: three round arches resting on pilasters of an order recalling the Doric, support a straight pediment on the tympanum of which the initials LB (Loubat de Bohan) can still be made out. The orangery continues to shelter orange and lemon trees during the winter period. Finally, the gardeners' house, a greenhouse datable to the 19th century, and the 'pottery' which, curiously, houses a niche. The walls still show traces of monochrome painted render. The presence of this niche leads some to say it could have been a chapel. Nothing confirms this hypothesis, however. These buildings are all constructed according to local tradition in rubble stone, flint and earth, the whole being rendered. They are covered with espalier vines. The structural work comprises, for the basement, ashlar stones from Montmerle and rubble stone, while the raised ground floor and first floor alternate white stone from Saint-Paul-Trois-Châteaux and brick (or brick-coloured render). The whole clearly evokes the architecture of the first half of the 17th century French, or even that of the late 16th century (notably by the deliberate presence of this banded order, a reference to the French order dreamed of by Philibert Delorme). Described by Viollet-le-Duc in his Habitations modernes (1875) as a 'country house' or 'rural dwelling', the building is designed by Corroyer according to a plan arrangement which presents no complexity: a simple rectangle flanked on either side by turrets, one of which housing a service staircase. The elevation reflects the severity of the plan: five bays on the façades ordered by pilasters, emphasized by the openings and volumetric play of the roofline. Inside, the circulation is arranged on either side of a central corridor accessible from the entrance at the centre of the building, which also provides access to the monumental staircase leading to the first floor. Sources: -Marie GLOC, Construire, restaurer, écrire. L'architecture dans tous ses états. Edouard-Jules Corroyer (1835-1904), architecte. Doctoral thesis under the direction of JM LEniaud, Paris, EPHE, 2003, 3 vol. -Alain GROS, 'L'hôtel de Bohan et François-Philibert Loubat, baron de Bohan (1751-1804)', Bulletin des sociétés savantes de l'Ain, 1976, no. 2, p. 3-34. -Frédérique TEZENAS DU MONTCEL, historical and landscape study of the Fleyriat estate, 2010, 113 p.