48 hours in Nantes

Centre-Val de Loire - Pays de la Loire/2023

Can a city's cultural policy influence its culinary scene? Without a doubt. And that's what Nantes has been proving for the past 30 years. This revival is the result of a genuine political will and a successful combination of urban planning and culture in a rundown urban environment where everything had to be (re)done.

On the ground, a green line runs through the city. It leads to the Mémorial de l'abolition de l'esclavage, to Daniel Buren's rings along a quay, to the Passage Pommeray, to a fantastic merry-go-round, to a giant measuring tape, to an indoor jungle invading the courtyard of a building, to a sculpture of a man stepping sideways... in short, a path to follow traced right on the ground, leading to over a hundred places and permanent or temporary works that make the city of Nantes a permanent game of discovery. Nantes creates a buzz not only with its artistic program, but also with its particularly dynamic culinary scene. In 1990, Nantes mayor Jean-Marc Ayrault (elected the previous year) asked Jean Blaise (who, at Jack Lang's request, had already founded a Maison de la Culture here in 1982) to awaken the city with a cultural event. "At the time, Nantes didn't look like much," says Jean Blaise, now director of Le Voyage à Nantes. Between the wars, the arms of the Loire were filled in, even though it was a city in the water, in favor of the car. Then came the bombings and, at the end of the 70s, the collapse of the shipyards. When Jean-Marc Ayrault arrived in Nantes in 89, the city had lost its identity and had lost almost everything. The mayor decided to focus on culture to give the city a new image. In 1990, the Allumées festival was launched, a six-night cultural event that placed Nantes among the world's great cities that live by night. The festival even dedicated its first edition to Barcelona, the epicenter of the Spanish movida. Over the next 6 years, Les Allumées laid the cornerstone for the city's cultural renewal, which became a lasting reality with the creation in 2000 of Le Lieu Unique, a multi-purpose cultural center housed in the former Lu cookie factory, rehabilitated by architect Patrick Bouchain. At the same time, a vast project to redevelop the Ile de Nantes was undertaken with architect and urban planner Alexandre Chemetoff. The aim was to create a new center and enhance the industrial heritage of the area by reconnecting with the Loire River. The famous Machines de L'ile took up residence in the nave of the Parc des Chantiers, where they remain to this day, and every day the Grand Éléphant takes to the streets, with a few visitors on its back, to the amazement of young and old alike. Today, start-ups and creative industries are taking up residence in the new buildings on the island, alongside the École des Beaux-Arts, the university cluster dedicated to digital culture and innovation, and the CHU, bringing new shops and restaurants in their wake. At Le Lieu Unique, in a space open to all, cuisine had its place. Culture has to be part of life, everywhere, all the time," says Jean Blaise. It goes through the way we dress, fashion and architecture. And also in the way we eat. Le Lieu Unique is open all year round, every day from 11am to 2am. There's a restaurant, a bar, a reading room, a hammam in the basement and a crèche on the second floor... You can spend days there without going to a show". In 2011, a new turning point for the city, and for Jean Blaise, with the creation of Le Voyage à Nantes, which is both the creator of the itinerary leading visitors to the works scattered around the city, and also responsible for promoting Nantes through culture. It was at this point that Richard Baussay, who had already worked as a music programmer at Le Lieu Unique, took on a more assertive and formal culinary role. "Back in 2005, we created an event combining music and wine," recounts Richard Baussay, "and that's how I rediscovered Muscadet. Because, like any good Nantais, I thought of it as an ordinary white wine for export. And then I met some winemakers who were making great wines! Based on this experience, Jean Blaise and I decided that gastronomy could also be part of Le Lieu Unique's programming. In the end, it was a bit like what I'd experienced with electronic music, where there was a need to mediate, to find forms of events to help the general public understand and appreciate things. It was also a time when chefs were starting to get out of their kitchens. In 2010, Jean Baussay organized his first event, Les Goûts Uniques, in collaboration with Omnivore, bringing together chefs and producers. The second edition, in 2012, was sponsored by Alain Passard and welcomed chefs William Ledeuil, Flora Mikula, Jean-Marie Baudic, Bertrand Grebaut...as well as local representatives of a culinary scene that was beginning to stir, and whose best ambassador at the time was Éric Guérin of La Mare aux Oiseaux. Ludovic Pouzelgues, who spent 4 years with Jean-Yves Guého at l'Atlantide, THE gourmet restaurant in Nantes, is also on board, having just opened his LuluRouget. In 2011, Le Voyage à Nantes published its first Tables de Nantes guide, which has since been published annually, featuring 87 addresses. Of these, only 16 remain today, reflecting the enormous renewal that took place over the following years. Dominic Quirke opened Pickles in 2014, Jean-François Pantaléon Roza in 2017, and the same year, Mathieu Pérou took over the reins of Manoir de la Régate, opened by his father Loïc in 1995. In 2018, Ingrid Deffein and Guillaume Decombat opened Sources, followed in 2019 by Lucie Berthier Gembara and Sarah Mainguy with their Sepia and Vacarme restaurants respectively. Nantes is creating a buzz with establishments such as Omija, Meraki, Les Cadets, Bairoz..., the Rosemary pastry salon, the Maison Arlot Cheng bakery-café, the Magmaa food hall... "The city's cultural dynamism is making it attractive," continues Richard Baussay. Chefs who have already set up shop are talking to their friends, saying: 'Rather than opening yet another restaurant in Paris, come to Nantes! There's plenty of room, great produce and a large public. And we support them by giving them visibility. The Nantes example has become an inspiring model of success, because it is economically profitable. Nantes ranks among the top 3 most attractive cities in the Paris region, and between 2014 and 2020 the metropolis welcomed around 9,000 new residents a year. The 2022 summer edition of Le Voyage à Nantes attracted 607,000 visitors, a figure approaching the pre-covid record figures. Every time we started an operation, we were looked at with a lot of doubts, especially by shopkeepers," concludes Jean Blaise. No one imagined, when we launched the Voyage à Nantes, that we'd be attracting visitors with contemporary art and that the economic spin-offs would be multiplied by ten. Our greatest achievement is to have succeeded in making people understand that culture, artistic creation, even when it's a bit crazy, even when it's incomprehensible, has an inestimable value."