Here we wish to highlight certain iconographic collections, particularly those related to the subject areas of environment and heritage. The collections in question comprise views of landscapes, buildings, works of art preserved in churches, postcards, various 19th-century archives, etc. The aim is to give you visual information on the local area, ranging from more sweeping panoramas to details of specific buildings or objects. You can use our comparison function in the viewer to see how this heritage and its immediate environment have developed over time.

The website covers the whole of historical Brittany. See below for a more detailed description of the collections. We're expecting further collections in the coming months, including aerial views, to complement Images Past and Present.

 

Introducing the collections

Travelling through the Ille-et-Vilaine département is an opportunity to discover many different landscapes, including plains, plateaus and coastline, resulting from geomorphology, shaped by erosion, along with centuries of human activity. A landscape is, above all, part of a local area as perceived and felt by its residents.*

Landscape atlases are tools that enable us to appreciate the unique nature of all the different landscapes making up a given territory. The Ille-et-Vilaine Département has partnered with State services to develop the Ille-et-Vilaine Landscape Atlas. This tool is now available online at https://paysages.ille-et-vilaine.fr and identifies twenty-nine landscape units making up a diverse patchwork. Describing the landscape structures has enabled us to identify the challenges and dynamics associated with each landscape unit.

*The etymology of the word landscape refers to "what we're given to see," "a chosen piece" of the land. The European Landscape Convention specifies the concept of a landscape as "part of the land, as perceived by local people or visitors, which evolves through time as a result of being acted upon by natural forces and human beings."

See website