Rue de Montmorency is one of the oldest streets in Paris, France.
The home of the famous alchemist Nicolas Flamel is on this street and some of the oldest standing stone structures in the city of Paris can be found there. The exterior is not described (CG74).
Inside it is “a creepy medieval drawing room” with moving figures and odd runes on the tapestries, and a large, clouded crystal ball (CG75).
There is a hall leading to the front door and a drawing room (CG80) also an alchemist’s studio in which there is a cupboard containing “glass vials, tubes, and the glowing Philosopher’s Stone” as well as a padlocked book embossed with a phoenix (CG86).
Commentary
Notes
The house at 51 Rue de Montmorency was built by Flamel after the death of his wife Pernelle. It was finished in 1407 and is now the oldest stone house in Paris. It’s here where Flamel is said to have carried out his experiments in alchemy. The house's facade became a monument historique on 23 September 1911. It is now an atmospheric restaurant, appropriately taking the name Auberge Nicolas Flamel.
Muggles believe that Flamel never lived in this house. He obviously used a Fidelius Charm to make that part of the house he wanted to occupy invisible to the neighbouring residents. Flamel devoted a huge chunk of his fortune to help the poor and founded many religious institutions, redecorated churches and cemeteries and built almshouses. The house in Rue de Montmorency was one of these almshouses where he let out the ground floor shop. He kept the upper floors in order to accommodate the laborers and gardeners who worked in the vegetable gardens located between the two ramparts.