Particularly Perpignan….with Henry Shaftoe

Perpignan is particularly well endowed with ‘hotels particuliers’

No, we are not talking Holiday Inns and Novotels, but the magnificent private mansions of well-to-do families constructed between the 16th and 19th centuries. It is estimated that there are over 100 of these buildings in the historic core of Perpignan, mostly tucked away discretely behind anonymous frontages. Once you know the giveaway signs (large double doors, surmounted by a shallow arched stone lintel over an opening big enough to allow the entry of a coach and horses),you will spot them almost everywhere in the old city.

It all started with the Casa Xanxo (8 rue de la Main de Fer), built around 1500 by a wealthy merchant. If you want to find out more about these hotels particuliers, this is a good starting point, as the Casa Xanxo is open to the public, is free to enter and has several rooms exhibiting the history of Perpignan.

The majority of these hotels particuliers have been converted into private apartments so are not accessible to the public, but you can sometimes go into the internal courtyards (for example : in rue du Théatre and rue Font Froide). Other courtyards are open as cafés or restaurants, notably in rue de l’Incendie, rue Mailly and rue de l’Ange.

The rather gloomy, but truly ancient, rue des Abreuvoirs (tucked away between Castillet and the cathedral) apparently has the highest concentration of hotels particuliers in the city, including one where Georges Sand and Frederick Chopin stayed before eloping to Majorca!

The Natural History Museum (12 rue Fontaine-Neuve) is a perfectly preserved ‘Hotel Particulier’, free to enter with the benefit of a mummified resident (from Egypt, not from Perpignan!) The art museum Hyacinthe Rigaud (2 rue Mailly) consists of two ‘Hotels Particuliers’ knocked into one.

And the crowning glory has to be Hotel Pams, (18 rue Emile Zola – free entry) a gorgeously over-the-top former dwelling of the rich cigarette paper making family, Bardou Job. As well as the dwelling, replete with delightfully kitsch and slightly risqué murals, you can visit the raised tropical garden at the back and part of the former cigarette paper factory, now used for modern art exhibitions.

So next time you are doing nothing in particular, why not go ‘hotel particulier’ spotting in Perpignan – I think you will be particularly impressed !