Photo : Jacques DASSIÉ / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Château de la Mercerie
In 1925 the brothers Raymond and Alphonse Réthoré settled at the Manoir de la Mercerie, at Magnac-Lavalette, 25 minutes from Angoulême. They set out to build a château-museum next to the 19th-century manor. Alphonse, a self-taught architect, drew the plans and directed the work; Raymond, mayor of Magnac-Lavalette, member of parliament for six terms and de Gaulle's Russian translator, paid for it.
Construction began in 1939 with the Azulejos room, behind the manor. Interrupted during the war, it continued until 1975 and ended with a 220-metre façade, protected as 20th-century heritage, which earned the site the nickname 'little Versailles of the Charente'.
After nearly thirty years of neglect, the château has been under restoration since 2011, thanks to the commune and the Château de la Mercerie association. The guided tour covers a dozen rooms, up to the Béruges room, then the grounds: the park, the recreated rose garden, the arboretum and the tomb of the Réthoré brothers.
