Presentation

Now a showcase for the high technology deployed in the conurbation, the Domaine de Soye dates back to the 18th century and retains many fine traces of its past. In addition to its ruined manor house, known as the "chateau", there's a 5,000m² "French-style" kitchen garden and 1,500m of majestic tree lines.

Of course, history wouldn't be what it is without our local glories: marine engineer Henri Dupuy-de-Lôme was born here in 1816, and poisoner Hélène Jégado made arsenic soup here in 1841, leaving a bitter memory... Jean Zay, the Front Populaire's Minister of Education, visited in 1936, Jacques-Armand Cardon, a press cartoonist, lived in barracks in his youth, and Jean-Yves Le Drian, a former minister, came to visit family and launched the Parc Technologique in the 1980s...

The estate's most astonishing use came in the 20th century.
A historic site for popular education in Lorient before the Second World War (École de plein-air, summer camps, "aérés" centers, youth hostel.From 1945 onwards, the estate was home to up to 307 wooden houses (barracks), erected to house bomb victims.
Although the village disappeared for good in 1985, the estate has become a place of remembrance, popular education, technological innovation and culture(s).