A Heart of Stone

Houses in Brittany - part 2 - walls

Welcome back. I have some wondeful pictures of dream houses for you today! 

Most traditional houses in Brittany are made of stones. Most, not all, some of them are built in wattle and daub and timber.

La plupart des maisons bretonnes traditionnelles sont construites en pierre. Mais certaines sont en torchis et colombages, comme cette maison de Lamballe.

But as a little girl I always fancied living in a stone house.

Mais, moi, depuis toute petite, j'ai rêvé d'habiter dans une maison en pierre.

Via Wikipedia

In the South of Brittany, where I spent some holidays as a child, stones have happy shades going from yellow to cream.

Dans le sud de la Bretagne, les pierres sont plus claires que dans le nord. Mais les pierres sombres du nord ont vraiment fini par conquérir mon coeur. 

Found on the "to buy" adds of some local newspaper, can't remember which, though.

In the North of Brittany, where I live now, stones are darker. They have really grown on me.

It's also quite common around here to have bricks around the windows and doors.

I believe though that those houses aren't that old, probably the early nineteenth century, but I haven't checked that, it's just a feeling, given how those houses are built.

Il est aussi fréquent d'avoir des briques autour des ouvertures. Dans ma propre maison, lors des travaux, j'ai retrouvé des briques marquées du nom de villages alentours, où se trouvaient auparavant des briqueteries.

I found old bricks when renovating my house, marked "Saint-Brieuc" and "Binic", two towns very close to my house. None of these towns still have brick fabrics (it's a little weird to say it out loud).

There's also a small part of the coast a little farther north that's called the Pink Granite Coast, because granite there has a very stunning pink shade.
 

Sur la côte de granit rose, on trouve des maisons qui utilisent avec parcimonie ou pas, le granit typique de cette toute petite côte.

Some houses are built using this granite.

If you have a look at the stones surrounding the windows, they are pink. The house below was found on Clévacances, which means you can rent it for holidays! Woudn't you fancy spending the summer there?

This one is so pink it's unreal. Because the stones are very regular, I suspect it was built after WWII. I'm sorry about the bin in the front, but this is the picture that was used by the owner to sell their house on OuestFranceImmo site!

Lots of the houses built after WWII are built of concrete with only details in granite. We call them "neo-bretonne".

Après la Seconde Guerre Mondiale a commencé la construction des maisons néo-bretonnes qui n'utilise plus le granit qu'à des fins "décoratives".

Because such was the trend in houses these days, some old stone houses had their stone walls recovered, like the one below.

C'était tellement la mode qu'on a même enduit des maisons qui étaient réellement en pierre!

This is what happened to my little fisherman's cottage also.

C'est ce qui est arrivé à ma Petite Maison.

Now this study wouldn't be complete without mentionning the kind of house people love building these days in Brittany.

Je ne peux pas ne pas évoquer les constructions qui poussent comme des champignons autour de mon cottage: des cubes gris et blancs qui s'emboîtent les uns dans les autres... Cela a une certaine classe parce que c'est très géométrique.

They look like cubes that collided in one another. Two very similar to that one were built next to my cottage.

Now, if you were to spend holidays in Brittany, which one would you choose to spend time in?

Bon, alors, laquelle choississez-vous pour vos prochaines vacances?

Thanks for joining me today!

PS: If you missed part 1 and want to see more wonderful houses, go here.

Si vous avez manqué la première partie et mourrez d'envie de voir d'autres maisons, cliquez ici.

I'm going to offer some eye-candy to the following parties.