Espace Arlaud, Art museum in Lausanne, Switzerland
Espace Arlaud is an art museum in Lausanne, Switzerland. It occupies a three-storey stone building with a pale grey-beige facade, arched openings on the ground floor, rectangular windows with carved surrounds above, and a tall pale-green banner reading "ESPACE ARLAUD" between the first and second floors.
The building was completed in 1840 to house a drawing school and an art museum, and the museum opened the following year. After the collections moved to the Palais de Rumine in 1904, the building served mainly as a primary school until a renovation in the 1990s turned it into a space for temporary exhibitions.
The building is named after Marc-Louis Arlaud, the painter who funded it, and a small plaque with his name still marks the main door. Inside, the exhibition rooms host shows organized by the cantonal museums and by the university library, and in September the space usually welcomes one of the exhibitions of the Lausanne comic book festival.
The museum is open only during temporary exhibitions, so check the schedule before you go. It sits right on Place de la Riponne, easy to reach by metro or bus, and the entrance is at street level with no steps.
The building was originally split into two separate parts with no inside connection: the lower level, funded by the city, held a primary school, while the upper floors, paid for by the canton and Arlaud's donation, housed the museum and the drawing school. A staircase linking the levels was only added in 1967.
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