Château de Syam

The château de Syam, also called the Palladian villa of Syam, is a construction inspired by the Venetian villas of Andrea Palladio, built between 1826 and 1828 in the Ain and Saine valley at Syam, south of Champagnole, in the Jura. The villa was built by the architect Champonnois the elder for the Syam ironmaster, Emmanuel Jobez, a shrewd businessman whose artistic taste was strongly inspired by Italy.

Instead of the first château built near the original forge, the martinet, Étienne Jobez wanted to move his new home away from the workshops and build the villa in the middle of a park, as well as stables inspired by the designs of Claude-Nicolas Ledoux.

Emmanuel Jobez died in 1828, before the villa was finished, but his descendants lived there until the early twentieth century. The villa, by marriage, fell into the hands of the family of President Sadi Carnot. From then on it was little occupied.

Despite relative abandonment, it was miraculously preserved from the ravages of time by the circulation of air through the ingenious heating system inspired by Roman baths. Thus during the visit you can still see nineteenth-century wallpapers and parquet floors in perfect condition.

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