Bought and completed in 1790 by Mr. Lormier-Lagrave, this town mansion the Hôtel de Bourrienne was subsequently bequeathed to Lormier-Lagrave's daughter, Fortunée Hamelin, in 1792. Fortunée, a friend of Joséphine de Beauharnais, then commissioned Bélanger to decorate the house. However, heavily in debt, she was forced to sell it in 1801 to Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne, a former companion of Napoleon's at the Military Academy of Brienne and his secretary since 1796. Dismissed in disgraced by Napoleon for his fraudulent business activities, he seldom occupied his home until his return after the Restoration. In 1824, Bourrienne moved to the country and sold the mansion.
Whilst the mansion owes its outside appearance to Bélanger, the Victories bearing with laurel wreaths decorating the façade overlooking the garden were designed by Leconte who had made the same for the Château de Villiers, bought by Murat in around 1800. The interior decoration, in the style of the Consulate period, has been preserved in many of rooms. The dining-room contains furniture by Jacob. The study, whose ceiling was once decorated with a painting by Prud'hon, has still the antique-style dadoes and cartouches, while the drawing room boasts a fine series of stucco panels and a painted ceiling representing a canopy. The bedroom is decorated in pure Pompeian style. The visit ends with the bathroom, painted in blue and gold, with its delicately chiseled mirrors and small columns. This charming town mansion is, in Paris, one of the few of the Empire period open to the general public..
Hôtel de Bourrienne
