• The Cité des imaginaires will house the Jules-Verne museum and other exhibition and dissemination spaces.

  • Its opening is scheduled for 2028, after the transformation of the building that will house it.

We should no longer speak of the "Cap 44 building" but of the "City of imaginaries".

Unveiled at the end of 2019, the project to transfer and enlarge the Jules-Verne museum in Nantes to this imposing blue building on the banks of the Loire, facing the Extraordinary Garden, is becoming clearer.

At the end of June, the elected representatives of the metropolitan council will have to decide in particular on the launch of this future cultural facility.

Initially announced for 2024 or 2025, the City of Imaginaries should finally not open its doors until 2028, Nantes town hall announced on Thursday.

Because important transformations are to be carried out on this old flour mill, whose cladding will indeed be removed, and which will be clipped on two levels, on one side only.

Saved because of its remarkable Hennebique concrete construction process, the building will therefore house an enlarged Jules-Verne museum (1,000 m2, compared to 250 currently), but also a temporary exhibition space, a "third place" type library, broadcasting and catering spaces and finally a panoramic terrace accessible to all, confirmed the elected officials on Thursday.

Budget of 50 million euros

"The City of Imaginaries will invite visitors to explore contemporary imaginaries that shed light on today's societal issues and to revisit the Vernian work and its current resonances", explains the city of Nantes about this metropolitan facility, with "radiation international intellectual and artistic.

The place will offer a “living museography” where the “public will be at the heart of the experience”, while it was in the City of the Dukes that the vocation of the writer was born, who spent his childhood there.

The choice of the project management team will be made at the end of 2022, for work to start in 2024. The estimated cost has been estimated at 50 million euros.

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Nantes: The imposing Cap 44 building will house a new large Jules-Verne museum

  • Nantes

  • Pays de la Loire

  • Museum

  • Culture

  • Exposure