Vieux-Lille | |
|---|---|
Quartier | |
 Entrance to Vieux-Lille via rue Esquermoise | |
 | |
| Coordinates: 50°38′36″N3°03′38″W / 50.64333°N 3.06056°W |
Vieux-Lille (Old Lille) is a district in the north of Lille. It is the district with the most pre-19th-century buildings. It still boasts many cobbled streets and traces of the canals that crisscrossed the city in centuries gone by. It is home to 20,000 inhabitants. [1]
Until the First World War, Vieux-Lille was the name given to the part of the city that predated the 1858 expansion, i.e., the area bordered to the west by Boulevard de la Liberté and to the south by Boulevard Louis XIV. During the First World War, the area around Rue de Béthune, the railway station, and Rue du Molinel was destroyed, and the Palais Rihour (18th-19th centuries) burned down. The destroyed areas were rebuilt in the style of the 1930s: Art Deco around rue du Molinel, neo-regionalist on rue Faidherbe and rue de Béthune. [2]
In the 1960s and 1970s, the destruction of the working-class Saint-Sauveur district left Vieux-Lille as the last remaining example of the city's pre-industrial architecture.
At the time, the northern part of the city center was the only old part of Lille that had been completely “preserved”. Escaping modernization, it was neglected until the 1980s by the more affluent residents, particularly in the area around Place aux Oignons. It's probably from this period that the name “Vieux-Lille” (Old Lille) has shifted to this area alone. A neighborhood of immigrants and impoverished large families, with a bad reputation until the 1980s, escaped a project to build an expressway through its center. Instead, it was restored under the successive mandates of Pierre Mauroy, and today has become a very dynamic commercial district. It's home to many bars, restaurants, and several stores, including luxury boutiques. Since its restoration, property prices have risen steadily, renewing the population almost entirely and leading to rapid gentrification. [3] [4]
Although Lille's origins date back to the 11th century in Vieux-Lille, in the area around the Notre-Dame de la Treille cathedral built on the ancient motte castrale, the “castrum” around Place aux Oignons and as far as the former Basse Deûle, now avenue du Peuple-Belge, the “forum” in the triangle between rue Basse, rue Esquermoise and rue Grande-Chaussée, [notes 1] most of what we call “Vieux-Lille” today is not the oldest part of the city.
The former faubourg de Weppes around the church of Sainte-Catherine, which lies roughly between the rue Léonard-Danel, the rue d'Angleterre to the north, the rue des Trois-Mollettes to the west, the rue de Weppes, the rue Thiers, the rue de la Baignerie to the southwest, the quai du Wault and the square du Ramponneau, was incorporated into the town by an extension of the city walls around 1370, becoming the fifth parish within the city walls, after the parishes of Saint-Pierre, Saint-Étienne, Saint-Maurice, and Saint-Sauveur. [5] [6]
The grounds of the former Château de Courtrai and its outskirts included in Lille's 1619-1622 enlargement (the area between Avenue du Peuple Belge, Rue du Pont-Neuf, Porte de Gand, and Boulevard Carnot) are also part of Vieux-Lille.
The part of Vieux-Lille to the north of rue du Pont-Neuf and rue Négrier [notes 2] dates back to the 1670 enlargement decided by Vauban after Louis XIV annexed the city to France. The streets in this part of the district, the parish of Saint-André, and the former parish of Sainte-Marie-Madeleine are characterized by their linear layout and regular plan. Most of these streets are lined with French-style buildings dating from the late 17th and 18th centuries, including numerous townhouses inspired by those built simultaneously in Paris. [7]
On the other hand, the looser streets at the junction of Vieux-Lille and the city center, and around the cathedral, are some of Lille's oldest: rue de la Clef, rue de la Grande-Chaussée, rue des Chats-Bossus, place aux Oignons, rue Basse, and more. [8]
After the disappearance of almost all medieval buildings (wooden houses), these streets are lined with buildings dating from the 17th and 18th centuries, rows of Flemish Renaissance-style houses from the 17th century, identical in proportions and rhythms but differing in decorative details, They are lined with rows of houses in the XVIIth-century Flemish Renaissance style, identical in proportions and rhythms but differing in the details of the decorations, XVIIth-century arcaded houses in the Lille style, or XVIIIth-century classical houses in the Lille style, and include few buildings from later periods, thus preserving the town's XVIIIth-century appearance.
Vieux-Lille is especially rich in rows of houses, mansions, and imposing buildings, over a thousand years of history.
The memory of the presence of rivers (through which the Deûle flowed through the town before being diverted to the north) is remarkable:
are buildings that have left their mark on the history and people of Vieux-Lille, making them part of the district's historical and cultural heritage.
Lille is a city in the northern part of France, within French Flanders. Positioned along the Deûle river, near France's border with Belgium, it is the capital of the Hauts-de-France region, the prefecture of the Nord department, and the main city of the European Metropolis of Lille.
The 6th arrondissement of Paris is one of the 20 arrondissements of the capital city of France. In spoken French, it is referred to as le sixième.
Joan, often called Joan of Constantinople, ruled as Countess of Flanders and Hainaut from 1205 until her death. She was the elder daughter of Baldwin IX, Count of Flanders and Hainaut, and Marie of Champagne.
The Métropole Européenne de Lille is the métropole, an intercommunal structure, composed by a network of big cities whose major city is the city of Lille. It is located in the Nord department, in the Hauts-de-France region, northern France – bordering both the Flemish and Walloon regions of Belgium. It was created in January 2015, replacing the previous Communauté urbaine de Lille, and covers that part of the Lille metropolitan area that lies in France. Its area is 671.9 km2. Its population was 1,179,050 in 2019, of which 234,475 in Lille proper. The annual budget of the métropole is €1,865 billion (2018).
La Petite France, in Alsatian dialect: Französel is the south-western part of the Grande Île of Strasbourg in Alsace in eastern France, the most central and characteristic island of the city that forms the historic center. The district is bounded to the north by the Quai de la Bruche (Brischstade), the Rue du Bain-aux-Plantes, the Place Benjamin-Zix and the Rue des Dentelles; to the east by the Rue du Pont-Saint-Martin, the Pont Saint-Thomas and the Mills footbridge; to the south by the Channel of Zorn-Mühle; to the west by the Covered Bridges.
Bruay-la-Buissière is a commune in the Pas-de-Calais department in the Hauts-de-France region in northern France.
The arrondissement of Lille is an arrondissement of France in the Nord department in the Hauts-de-France region. It has 124 communes. Its population is 1,237,472 (2016), and its area is 879.5 km2 (339.6 sq mi).
Bellême is a commune in the Orne department in northwestern France. It is classed as a Petites Cités de Caractère. The musicologist Guillaume André Villoteau (1759–1839) was born in Bellême, as was Aristide Boucicaut (1810-1877), owner of LeBon Marché, the world's first department store. This town is possibly the origin of the English and French surname Bellamy.
Lille Cathedral, the Basilica of Notre Dame de la Treille, is a Roman Catholic church and basilica in Lille, France, and the cathedral of the Archdiocese of Lille. An example of Gothic Revival architecture, the cathedral is considered a national monument.
Isbergues is a commune in the Pas-de-Calais department in the Hauts-de-France region of France.
Tilques is a commune in the Pas-de-Calais department, Hauts-de-France region in northern France. The placename derives from medieval Flemish: Tilleke.
Aisey-sur-Seine is a commune in the Côte-d'Or department in the Bourgogne-Franche-Comté region of eastern France.
Arnould de Vuez was a painter of Flemish origin active in Lille from 1680 to 1720.
Simon Vollant was a 17th-century French engineer, entrepreneur and architect ennobled in 1685.
Cesny-les-Sources is a commune in the Calvados department in northwestern France. The municipality was established on 1 January 2019 by merger of the former communes of Cesny-Bois-Halbout, Acqueville, Angoville, Placy and Tournebu.
Armand Henri Georges Lemay was a French architect, one of the many prominent designers active in Lille during the era of extensive growth before the First World War.
Place du Général-de-Gaulle is an urban public space situated in the commune of Lille, Hauts-de-France region. It is the town's historic main square. It has a grand-place style, which is typical of many cities in the former Netherlands.
Rue Esquermoise is a street in Lille.
The collegiate church of Saint-Pierre was once a large church located in Vieux-Lille, and for almost 750 years it set the pace for Lille's religious life. Seriously damaged during the Austrian siege of 1792, its destruction began in 1794. Its crypt, the only remaining vestige, was listed as a historic monument in 1971.
The history of Lille dates back to the 11th century when Baudouin V of Flanders endowed the recently founded collegiate church of Saint-Pierre with a charter in 1066.