Château Burrus

French abandoned chateau in Alsace
48°15′46″N 7°13′26″E / 48.2629°N 7.2240°E / 48.2629; 7.2240Completed1900OwnerMaurice BurrusTechnical detailsFloor count3Lifts/elevators1Design and constructionArchitect(s)Jules Berninger, Gustave Krafft
Monument historique
Designated21 January 1993Reference no.IA68007218

Château Burrus is a château in Sainte-Croix-aux-Mines, in the department of Haut-Rhin, Alsace, France. It was built in 1900 and has been listed as a historical monument since 1993.[1]

History

Maurice Burrus

It was the family home of Maurice Burrus, a tobacco manufacturer and famous boss, built in 1900. During the Second World War, the chateau was requisitioned and transformed into a training centre for SS officers. It is in neo-baroque style. Maurice Burrus belonged to one of the largest families of tobacco manufacturers. The factory was closed in 1947, and after Maurice's death in 1959, the building was sold to a religious congregation and then resold to private individuals. Today, the building has been abandoned and is often visited by urban explorers.[2] In 2022 a family bought the château and started renovating it.[3]

Architecture

The chateau is in neo-baroque style like Opéra Garnier (1875) or Saint-Maurice church in Freyming-Merlebach (1913). The architects are two Alsatians who studied in Stuttgart and at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, Jules Berninger and his brother-in-law Gustave Krafft.

The ground floor consists of eight rooms and a large hall.

The hall features Ionic and Corinthian-style columns and is adorned with fake yellow marble. It is in the centre of the chateau and opens onto all the rooms and all the floors.

The green room[4] is adorned with mirror holders which considerably enlarge the room. It is adorned with a ceiling painted with a slightly cloudy sky.

The red room[4] is the most opulent, with its two fake red marble columns, its copper gilding which magnifies all the ceiling details, doors and walls covered in some places with red satin silk tapestries.

The wooden room[4] is, as its name suggests, all in wood from floor to ceiling and half of the wall covered with embossed cardboard tapestries. Renaissance-style furniture proudly stands in the room.

  • The green room
    The green room
  • The green room
    The green room
  • The doors of the red room
    The doors of the red room
  • Columns in the red room
    Columns in the red room
  • The wooden room
    The wooden room
  • The hall and its fake yellow marble
    The hall and its fake yellow marble
  • The stairs and its large window
    The stairs and its large window
  • View of the glass roof from the first floor
    View of the glass roof from the first floor

References

  1. ^ Base Mérimée: IA68007218, Ministère français de la Culture. (in French) Maison : Château Burrus
  2. ^ "Sainte-Croix-aux-Mines. Intervention au Château Burrus". www.dna.fr (in French). Retrieved 2021-09-21.
  3. ^ Malal, Sylvie (19 July 2022). "Haut-Rhin : la renaissance du château Burrus, à Sainte-Croix-aux-Mines, laissé à l'abandon depuis une trentaine d'années". France Info. Retrieved 20 July 2022.
  4. ^ a b c These names are not official; they are just names the urban explorers give.
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