Most visitors to France have heard of the Marne Valley, east of Paris, only because Disneyland is located there, but the verdant river valley is home to many wonderful attractions, not the least of which is the town of Noisiel, once the fief of the Menier chocolate company. Collectors of antique French advertising posters will recognize the naughty little girl writing the name of her favorite chocolate on a yellow wall, the same color as the wrappers of the chocolate bars still sold today, although they are now made in Switzerland (the Menier company became part of the Nestlé conglomerate in 1996).
The Old Town of Noisiel is a monument to the Menier company. The chocolate factory’s mill, a marvel of 19th-century industrial architecture straddling the river, still stands, and so does the paternalistic and utopian world built by the Menier family, notably Émile-Justin Menier (1826-81), a world-traveling businessman with the heart of a humanist who wanted to not only ensure the production and profits of his factory but also to provide his workers with a decent life. To ensure the success of those not-always-compatible goals, he went to great lengths to keep his employees and their wives and children happy. He built a cité ouvrière (workers’ town) for them, starting with small, affordable two-family houses with gardens, each one with entries on opposite sides of the building to ensure privacy for the two families. Émile also built schools for the workers’ children and a hospital/retirement home. Medical care was free, and employees were given pensions when they retired.
Twenty-four of the houses remain, many of them transformed by post-Menier owners, although some have retained their original form. The town still owns the detailed architectural plans for the houses, right down to the choice of toilet seats.
To admire the workers’ houses and get the feel of the cité ouvrière, start from the historic mairie (town hall), which retains all its 19th-century charms, walk up the Rue Henri Menier (all the streets the Old Town are named after members of the family), then turn left onto Place Émile Menier, the square that was the center of the town’s, social, civic and commercial life.
Proof that Émile, who was also the mayor of Noisiel, thought of everything: the café he installed in the town square was divided into different areas so that men of opposing political persuasions would be separated when they met up there on Sundays (men only; the women had to do the laundry on Sundays, even though they, too, had worked all week in the factory). In spite of Émile’s precautions, however, political fights still broke out in the town square. In the café’s basement, films were shown and improving lectures given. It was also used for rehearsals by the town chorus – once again, open only to men.
The town square, still intact, was also home to a butchershop, a bakery, two food markets per week, a hotel and dining hall for visitors and many other services, including a strictly laïc school for the workers’ children. The school was free and obligatory until the age of 13, when the students were sent off to work in the factory. The town library was also free, and there were night classes for illiterate workers. The company even financed the town’s fire department.
From an elaborate statue put up in the middle of the square in 1898, Émile surveilles the town he created to supply France with chocolate. The statue pays homage to Nicaragua, where Menier sourced its cacao from its own plantations and shipped it to France in its own boats. The company also had a rail line and a model farm near the town, the Ferme Buisson, whose buildings have now been repurposed as a national theater complex with seven stages, a cinema and a restaurant.
Nestlé, which had used the old factory as its French headquarters, has moved on, and the town is now reflecting on its future. There is talk of a luxury hotel, but development is constrained by the many buildings in Noisiel that are classified as historical monuments.
Other non-Disney delights are available to visitors in the area, just a short train ride or drive from Paris. A day trip to Noisiel could include a stroll in the city’s English-style park; a visit to the neoclassical Château de Champs-sur-Marne and its park; or a walk around the Île-De-France Olympic Nautical Stadium. For a tranquil float or more exciting rafting on the Marne River, rent a boat at Torcy Canoë Kayak.
Noisiel is not just a historic relic, as the living museum that is the Old Town might suggest. In the 1970s, as part of the nouvelle ville (new town) of Marne-la-Vallée, Noisiel was graced – or defaced, depending on one’s view of modern architecture of the time – with a series of new buildings, but that’s another story for another day.
For a wealth of information on what to do in Noisiel and its environs, visit the Paris-Marne Valley Tourism site. Click here to schedule a visit to the chocolate factory. To learn more about what life was like in the company town, read the novel En Famille (1893) by Hector Malot, set mostly in Noisiel, downloadable here.
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