From the Perrier boarding house to the Musée Lamartine, stages in the construction of memory

When Alphonse de Lamartine stayed in Aix-les-Bains, hotels were few and far between. Most visitors taking a cure at a spa stayed at inns and family-run boarding houses. It was at one of these, owned by the surgeon Pierre-François Perrier, that Alphonse de Lamartine stayed in 1816. There, he met Julie Charles, who had come from Paris to heal after suffering from tuberculosis. A passionate romance grew between the two, set against the landscapes of Savoy. In January 1817, the couple met again in Paris, where Julie introduced the young poet to the scholars, writers and politicians who frequented the salon of the Institut de France. The lovers promised to spend the summer together at the Perrier boarding house, but Julie’s condition worsened and Lamartine found himself alone in Aix-les-Bains. So he returned to the places he had visited with Julie the previous year. The melancholy that filled him and the surrounding landscapes inspired him to write and gave rise to several poems in Méditations poétiques. Published in 1820, the collection was met with resounding success.

Subsequent owners of Doctor Perrier’s boarding house saw the value of perpetuating the memory of the poet around this romantic story. Alexandrine Chabert, who inherited the house in 1841, undertook extensive renovation works to the building but was careful to preserve the writer’s memory. The evocation of the room of Alphonse de Lamartine and Julie Charles became a major draw for tourists to the establishment. 

1920 was a significant milestone leading up to the museum’s creation : it was the year in which the “Initiatives Committee” of Aix-les-Bains held an exhibition commemorating Lamartine, with paintings and sculptures, at Casino Grand Cercle. It was also at this time that the Chabert mansion was put up for sale by the family and acquired by the Town at the mayor’s request. During discussions leading to the purchase of the building and part of its furniture, the mayor stated that Elvire – the name given to Julie Charles by Lamartine in the novel Raphaël that he published in 1849 – had stayed there. This marked a gradual shift towards fiction and plans for the Musée Lamartine took shape.

Inaugurated in 1925, the museum had to be closed in 1933 when the building was demolished to create a new thermal spa. It was reborn in 1937 after pressure was exerted by the committee dedicated to Lamartine and its president: a room at the Villa des Fleurs was fitted out with the furniture, which was later added to by many donations. This faithful reconstruction gradually gave way to an evocation of the figure of Lamartine. The museum remained at the Villa des Fleurs until 1948, when its contents were moved to be put on display in one of the rooms at Villa des Chimères, now the Musée Faure.