Paris1972-Versailles2003

And voilà, a wonderful find in my vault of many pictures many unclassified over the years! We have been to this town many many occasions especially on Christmas time where the best market in Brittany is held in my opinion. Several posts on my blog but left this picturesque house at the entrance to the town which needs to be told more in details. Ahh Rochefort en Terre is in my beautiful Morbihan, of my lovely Bretagne, and in my belle France.

Let me then, tell you a whole lot more of the Villa Sainte Hortense of Rochefort en Terre!!

The Villa Sainte-Hortense, is a nice property from the “Belle Epoque”, inserted in a green setting of more than one hectare fully enclosed, just two hundred meters from the historic heart of the small town of Rochefort en Terre. This property originally belonged to Louise Mougeat. A wealthy heiress from a family in Finistère (dept29) , she had discovered the exceptional site of Rochefort through her friend and distant relative, Marie Maitrot de Varennes, who lived there. This is what decided her, in 1898, to acquire land in the town, to build this house there. The residence, was completed in 1902, as well as the stables and the park which surrounds it. Louise Mougeat, an orphan at a very young age, had been raised by her uncle and aunt, Léon and Hortense Bouchant, hence the name of the house.

Combining classicism and modernity, this imposing but elegant residence is typical of the architecture of these large villas built at the end of the 19C, and the beginning of the 20C by a well-to-do bourgeois in many holiday resorts. Rising over four levels, the main body of the building is flanked by a hexagonal turret housing a vast wooden staircase. The first level, in the semi-basement, houses the service rooms. The second level the reception rooms. The third and fourth levels are the bedrooms, seven in total of varying sizes, including one on the top floor, embellished with a granite terrace overlooking the park. From its origins, the Villa Sainte-Hortense was equipped with a running water system and central hot air heating: it was, at that time, the only house in Rochefort to have such modernism. A few years later, an elevator was even installed in the center of the stairwell! But this equipment, unfortunately not very aesthetic and which was no longer in working order, was dismantled by the current owners who preferred to restore the beautiful and vast stairwell to its original appearance. This house is now inhabited year-round by the owners.

A dependency of the Villa Sainte-Hortense, the stables date from the same period. This beautiful stone construction with a carved granite facade strangely evokes, thanks to its overhanging roof and its earthenware frieze, Asian architecture. With a floor area of ​​75 square meters, the building has two levels: the first, closed by two large wooden gates, housed the horse boxes on one side, and the garage for the carts on the other. The second was a large attic which was accessed by a narrow internal staircase. It was in 2004 that the owners undertook the rehabilitation of these places. On the first level, in the stable boxes, is a bookstore/Library run by the owners. On the other side, the second level has direct and level access to the park: this is where the Sainte-Hortense gite is located.(not visited).

The park that surrounds the property forms an elongated triangle of 1.2 hectares. The enclosure wall, made of local slate stone, runs along the street for 300 metres. At each of the two ends, large wrought iron gates allow direct access on one side to the center of the village, on the other to the surrounding countryside. Inside, the many beeches, oaks, chestnuts and hazelnut trees rub shoulders with species less common in our regions, such as the cedars of Lebanon or the Himalayas, hemp palms or ginkyo biloba, two species originating from China.

The official Villa Sainte Hortense gîte with history : https://www.gite-sainte-hortense.fr/accueil/la-villa-sainte-hortense/

The official Bookstore/Librarie Sainte Hortense : https://www.librairie-sainte-hortense.fr/

There you go folks, a dandy spot in my beautiful Rochefort en Terre, a must to visit while in the area. The Villa Sainte Hortense is another architectural jewel and nice history to boot. Hope you have enjoy the post as I.

And remember, happy travels, good health, and many cheers to all!!!