14/11/2024
This bizarre silhouette dominating the Cap de Nice has become so familiar that no one today seems to appreciate the incongruity of such a construction in this place.
The people of Nice very quickly christened it « the Englishman’s Folly » or « the Smith Folly » after its builder, Colonel Robert Smith.
The latter was a genuine colonel in the Indian Army, who came to settle in Nice in the 1850s to live out a peaceful retirement.
His means allowed him to acquire a vast plot of land measuring 35,000 square metres dominating the port.
He then undertook the construction of a rather strange residence, the construction of which lasted four years and proved ruinous. With its rounded battlements and its massive polygonal tower bristling with pinnacles, its eclectic architecture would have been inspired by the neo-Mughal constructions doubtless familiar to the colonel during his years of service…
The park, which descends to the sea, includes many factories, towers, belvederes,kiosks and staircases, all of which reflect the same fanciful exoticism.
One thing is certain - the construction has caused much ink and saliva to flow. The most ferocious remains Stephen Liégeard, sub-prefect and renowned columnist, brilliant inventor of the name « Côte d’Azur ». In a text from 1877, he does not hesitate to affirm that « it is an agglomeration of buildings resembling neither a villa, nor a tower, nor a wedding cake, nor a Savoy cake, nor anything that has a name in any language ».
