Musée des Avelines, Local museum in Saint-Cloud, France
The Musée des Avelines occupies a 1930s villa and displays art collections alongside exhibits about Saint-Cloud's history. The rooms present works by local artists, the Charles Oulmont collection, and materials related to the town's former castle.
Alfred Daniel-Brunet, a pharmaceutical industrialist and art collector, had the villa built between 1928 and 1935 by architect Louis Mourot, modelled on the villa Kérylos at Beaulieu-sur-Mer. After his death in 1943, his widow sold it in 1979 and the town of Saint-Cloud acquired it by pre-emption. Restored by François Hacq in 1986, it opened as a museum in 1988.
The museum is named after the avelines, the hazelnut trees that gave their name to the Jardin des Avelines it shares with the town's médiathèque and music and dance conservatory. Inside, the permanent display is organised in four themes, from Saint Clodoald's founding of the town to the château and its soft-paste porcelain.
The museum opens Wednesday through Saturday from noon to 6 pm and on Sundays from 2 pm to 6 pm, with no admission fee. Weekday hours are shorter than weekend hours.
Before becoming a museum, the villa Brunet served as a film set for three features: Tout feu, tout flamme (1982) by Jean-Paul Rappeneau, La Belle Captive (1983) by Alain Robbe-Grillet and L'Amour par terre (1984) by Jacques Rivette. The rotunda, restored in 2009, now houses the Musée Gourmand tea room.
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