The building was set up on a piece whose site is particularly interesting; it is next to, in the west the wall of city and the “porte au Vent ou au Vert” and seems, since the end of XVème century at least, to belong to “maison-forte de Vuippens”, located at north (under the current theatre).

A first house should thus take seat inside the wall of city, leaned with this last, shortly after its construction, that is to say about the middle of XIIIème century already; starting from the first documentary sources consulted, since the medium of XVème century, and until 1571, the piece on which is built a construction, raises directly of “maison-forte de Vuippens”.

Since 1560, the house and the garden located in the braies (space located between the wall of city and the ditch, belonging to the defensive system), are in hand of “Jehan Leyvraz” which obtains the “Petit Conseil”, executive authority of the city, the authorization to repair the wall of city, in ruin, by destroying its crowning up to the level of merlons and by covering the masonry of a roof, perhaps in prolongation of his; it can also replaster and coat the face of the wall of city directed towards the Market Place, with the proviso of leaving there the loopholes “to demonstrate always that its a city wall”.

In 1595, the building, then in hand of an architect “maistre Anthoine Paully”, is rebuilt.

It is probably only after the large fire of 1688, which destroyed partially the “tour-porte au Vent ou au Vert”, that the owner, “Jean Royer” increases his building by building the first construction, “extra muros”, in the braies; the house is used then as cabaret is “wine vintage”.

Bought in 1730 per “Albert Philippe Morier”, the building still presents an establishment identical to that of the plan of 1699, with an enlarging and garden in the braies. It is only in second half of the XVIIIème century that the building acquires current dimensions and provisions, with a large frontage open on the Market Place; part of the building, always with public vocation, shelters a “cabaret with the ensign of the home of hunting”.

The destruction of the tour-porte au Vent ou au Vert, in 1798, the rebuilding partial of the frontage will require on street as well as the resumption or creation of the roof in Mansart; many interior installations still testify of this important transformer stage.

The last transformations of the coffee, located at the ground floor, about 1930, deeply modified the organization of the frontage on street, by destroying the provisions and decorations of the XVIIIème century; they however preserved a portion of the city wall.

Octobre 2005
Luigi Napi, Historian of regional monumental Art & archaeologist

Pierre and Joelle Clement, collectors, have invested in this house to present Australian Aboriginal art in Europe. Challenge and passion related to a thorough knowledge of artists of the Australian desert and their thousand-year-old culture.

They open to the public a door privileged on the territories of the Dreams.