The Domaine de Maison Rouge is a large agricultural estate first settled 300 years ago. It is all that remains of an 18th century coffee plantation.
An estate organised around coffee farming
The concession, awarded by the Compagnie des Indes orientales, was cultivated by the Desforges-Boucher family around 1730. The estate around the manor house, which was used to grow coffee and clove trees, included the main house with an upper floor, a separate kitchen, the courtyard and argamasse terraces, pens for draught animals and livestock, wooden shops and the slave camp.
Following the introduction of sugarcane to the island in the early 19th century, the new owners – the Nairac-Murat family – built a sugar refinery. A minority of farms continued to grow coffee and maize.
The estate is now home to the Indian Ocean Museum of Decorative Arts (MADOI).
