Restored 16th Century Townhouse in the Last Medieval Walled Town in the Anjou

Property Description

La Maison Aubelle is a typical 16th century Loire Valley ‘hôtel particulier’, tufa (limestone) walls, slate roofs and a pepperpot tower.
The property comprises the house with high stone walls, a carriage entrance, a completely private garden: lawn, mature trees and shrubs, large, south-facing terrace, garage, additional off-street courtyard parking and a games room.
Maison Aubelle benefits from all mains services, oil-fired central heating, telephone and wifi, mains water and drainage, and has a satellite dish to receive international television broadcasts as well as an aerial for the French terrestrial service.
The house comprises one ground floor 1-bedroom apartment and two 1st floor 2-bedroom apartments. A separate wing houses a 1-bedroom duplex with its own terrace. All bedrooms are en-suite and all apartments have living rooms and fully equipped kitchens. Vast roof spaces on the second floor provide opportunities for conversion.
Going from the top to the bottom, huge cellars run under the house and gardens, originally (500 years ago) used to source building stone for the house. They include a fitted wine cellar.
Currently used as full-time owners' accommodation plus three apartments for discerning holidaymakers, Maison Aubelle would also make a fine family home (as it was for the 300 years before its sale in 1997), with 5 B&B rooms (the maximum allowed) plus a gîte, a joint purchase by a group of friends, an elegant retirement home, a conference centre, conversion to a boutique hotel or a restaurant with rooms … so many possibilities.
Montreuil-Bellay has a kindly climate, la douceur angevine, clear and sunny most of the time, but not swelteringly hot like the south of France. It snows in occasional years, but when you see the local children’s excitement you realise how rarely it happens.
The town of Montreuil-Bellay grew up around the original 11th century château, overlooking the River Thouet, tributary of the Loire, founded by Foulkes Nerra, Count of Anjou. Up to the 18th century, Montreuil-Bellay was the administrative centre for a very large area, hence Maison Aubelle, then home to one of the powerful bureaucrats. But, after the Revolution, this power moved to Saumur, 10 miles to the north. Nowadays, Montreuil-Bellay is part of the Saumur agglomeration, although remaining locally active with its two industrial estates on the southern outskirts of the town. Two primary schools, a collège (middle school) and a lycée (senior school) specialising in viticulture and horticulture ensure a breadth of education for the local youngsters. There is a full range of shops, including one large and one small supermarket, other shops and all services, as well as a weekly market in front of the château. Several restaurants in town cater for all tastes, from pizza to traditional French cuisine.
Montreuil-Bellay is surrounded by vineyards growing mostly chenin and cabernet sauvignon for the Saumur appellation white, red and rosé wines, as well as champagne-method crémant de Loire. Most vineyards welcome visitors and offer wine-tasting. As well as dinners in the street or in the vines hosted by the local restaurants and/or vignerons, several events, attracting people from all over France, take place every year: book restoration, cartoon artists, a biennial medieval fair when bands of knights install their camps around the town and stage an attack on the château (spoiler: Geoffrey Plantagenet wins – he did and always does), a music festival and another one of gypsy music, a one-day painting competition, while animated guided walks around the town take place all through the summer. Art exhibitions are held in a restored chapel two minutes down the road.
Those who prefer to be less organised may enjoy signposted country walks and cycle tracks, fishing in the Thouet, golf on a choice of courses, tennis on the town’s courts, riding at excellent local stables and, of course, wine-tasting.
Within an hour’s drive are Saumur (equestrian centre of France), Angers (good shopping, tremendous château built to withstand a siege), Cholet and, slightly further, Tours. Châteaux of the western Loire are within an easy day’s visit, as are Futuroscope at Poitiers and Le Puy du Fou. Montreuil-Bellay’s own château, towering over the River Thouet, a tributary of the Loire, still privately owned but open to the public from April to November, is a five minute stroll away. The most famous local attraction is the Royal Abbey at Fontevraud, and we particularly like the Bioparc at Doué la Fontaine, a most un-zoo-like zoo with huge ‘environments’ for the animals and not a cage in sight. Slightly further afield are all sorts of museums, from the ancient commerces to ancient machines, tanks and armoured cars to mushrooms.
Access is easy. The airports of Tours, Poitiers and Nantes are an easy drive. Angers/Macé is likely to grow in importance with the non-expansion of Nantes and La Rochelle (great restaurants!) has a limited service. Even Paris is only three hours away. By car – and who can resist stocking up on wine while they are here? – we are about three hours from the ports of Caen, Saint Malo and Dieppe and five hours from Calais. And TGVs arrive at Angers or Tours, where there are easy car hire facilities.