Roanne (Loire). “It will be a tool of attractiveness”, promised Yves Nicolin, mayor of Roanne, during the presentation of the Joseph-Déchelette Museum expansion project ahead of the municipal council which was held on June 11. Under study for several years, this flagship project of the municipal team is seeing its implementation become clearer. From September 20, the Museum of Fine Arts and Archeology will close its doors to make way for the moving of the collections. A long operation which will last until the start of the work, scheduled for the end of 2027. The stated objective: to reopen the museum by the end of 2030.
Over the course of the discussions, the content of the project has also evolved significantly. The active land policy of the City, which has recently made several acquisitions on neighboring plots, has notably redefined the perimeter of the future museum. The scientific and cultural project (PSC), validated in December 2022, initially provided for a budget of 20 million euros – including 6 million euros in subsidies paid as part of the State-Region plan contract – to renovate and expand the museum. With a surface area of 2,622 m², the latter was then to be redeployed over approximately 4,000 square meters, enough to increase the capacity of its reserves and exhibition spaces. Today, the overall investment is estimated at 28 million euros, an amount described as“ambitious, measured and supervised” by the municipality, which intends to spend 13 million euros for the work and 2 million euros for the scenography. And by retaining the proposal from the Moatti-Rivière agency, winner of the architectural competition launched in October 2025, the City ultimately increases the surface area of the future museum to 5,770 m².
Restoration of geometry
Two new wings with a copper facade will be built around the historic mansion. For the Moatti-Rivière agency, this extension is designed “as an act of restitution”aiming to “rediscover the courtyard of honor in its original geometry and restore the building’s monumentality”. Once restored, the Valence de Minardière hotel will host two educational workshops on the ground floor and part of the permanent course on two floors. To the north, the new “Déchelette wing” will bring together reception and mediation spaces, a new temporary exhibition room on the ground floor and collections from the permanent exhibition on the first floor. Finally, to the south, the new, smaller “Beaulieu wing” will be devoted to the logistics of the works with reserves and a restoration workshop.
“Some more recent buildings will be demolished, including extensions dating from the 1990s, as well as a library annex to make the mansion more visible,” specifies the City in a press release. Behind these transformations lies a clear ambition: to breathe new life into this museum with its aging image, which had only welcomed a little over 10,000 visitors in 2024. Completely saturated, the museum could only exhibit barely 5 to 10% of its collections, which cover fields as varied as fine arts, ceramics, archeology and even industrial art.
