Cafés and shops of the past

At the end of the 19th century about 2,000 people lived almost self-sufficiently: a dozen cafés, ten grocers, three bakers, four butchers, hairdressers, a clog-maker, a forge, a garage, a pharmacy… Many shops closed after the retail park arrived in 1983. Since the 1990s, cafés, restaurants, ice-cream shops and artists’ studios have taken over the old fronts.

• Le Poussin rouge

  Quai Boissard. A name and a colour since 1941. A communist owner, or a family of poultry farmers? The story hesitates.

• Le Pavillon / La Reine Blanche

  A place for weddings and banquets from 1900, renamed after the film.

• La Civelle

  A hardware shop that became a dance bar with a terrace on the Loire in the 1920s.

• Cycles Peugeot

  You left your bicycle here before taking the Roquio to the yards. The sign is still there.

• La Terrasse

  A former café-tobacconist, now L’Heureux Hasard.

  See L’Heureux Hasard

• The butcher’s in rue Barban

  Closed in the early 1980s, it kept its fine mosaic front.

• Le Café de la Brise

  Absinthe was served the old way, with a spoon and sugar.

The old-shops walk

Sources: Rezé Histoire no. 97 (April 2026), “3 walks to understand Trentemoult”, Rezé Histoire association – rezehistoire.fr. Texts rewritten by trentemoult.com; for more, get the magazine.