The gardens

It was in the Middle Ages, with the construction of the modest Saint-Barthélémy chapel, in 1247, that the Villa Arson site entered Nice’s history books. Dedicated to agriculture since Antiquity, from 1955 onwards it was home to Tuscan Capuchin monks who planted vines and olive trees on the land.

In the middle of the 18th century, the agricultural estate belonged to the Peyre de La Coste clan, who built a country villa on the crest of the hill. The building, in Genoese style, was surrounded by gardens with Italian-style terraces on the south side, and a classic French-style garden on the north side.

Following the upheaval caused by French revolutionary troops in the County of Nice, the villa and its grounds were acquired by Pierre-Joseph Arson, a wealthy merchant and banker. Arson dedicated himself to renovating and improving the buildings and gardens, planting numerous pine trees, cypresses and holm oaks. An artificial grotto, statues, fountains, balustrades, “calades” (paved streets), a colonnade and a pergola comprised the garden’s mineral decor, which progressively leaned towards the Rococo style.

At the end of the 19th century, when the French Riviera was booming, the villa was transformed into the Grand Hôtel Saint-Barthélemy. While it managed to escape the exoticism then in vogue throughout the region, the garden was slightly modified to welcome winter tourists. At the time it was listed in guidebooks as the most typical classical Italian garden on the Riviera.

After serving as a clinic for several decades, the villa and gardens had fallen into neglect by the time they were given to the State in 1965. The Ministry of Culture wanted to build a new kind of institution on the site and chose architect Michel Marot for the task.

Designed by Marot, Villa Arson’s modern garden consists of a central lawn featuring paved circles with plants, or more often a tree, at their heart. Sourced from five continents, the vegetation of this new garden, through its diverse roots, symbolises the Villa Arson’s openness to every horizon. The paving stones, specially created for the site, take the form of two interlocking trapezoids or triangles: motifs to be found across the paving of the Villa Arson and its garden.

The century-old olive trees, planted by Capuchin monks in the 16th century, are the last witnesses of the estate’s agricultural vocation. Even today, they still produce the small Nice olives harvested in good years to make the mild, fruity olive oil characteristic of the region.

The roofs of the new buildings feature hanging gardens instead of terraces. The gardens were extensively redesigned by Marot, who gave them a new, modern layout in which architecture and vegetation were closely intertwined.

Visits are animated by a series of in-situ works produced over the years during exhibitions or as public commissions for the site.