Château de Peufeilhoux

En un regard

Le château en bref

Château de Peufeilhoux is located in the commune of Vallon-en-Sully, in the Allier department, overlooking the Tronçais forest and the valleys of the Cher and the Aumance. A wooden structure probably occupied the site as early as the Early Middle Ages, before being replaced in the 14th century by a building of pink sandstone. The castle then passed through the hands of several noble families, including the lords of Pierrebrune at the end of the 16th century, and then the Villatte family, lords of Courtines, who owned it from around 1709 to 1900; it gradually deteriorated during this period. In 1920, Michel Machard acquired the estate and undertook major restoration work with the architect René Sappin des Raynaud between 1920 and 1927, in a Neo-Gothic spirit with a façade inspired by the Burgundian Renaissance, featuring mullioned windows, towers, turrets and a chapel with a pavilion roof. The castle, with its double curtain wall, gateways and outbuildings, has been registered (inscrit) as a Monument historique since 4 January 2021. Privately owned since 2013 by Claude Thévenin, it now houses an explorers' museum devoted to the natural sciences as well as an Egyptian museum, and is open to visitors.