Pierre Bullet

Pierre Bullet was a French architect. He was one of the students of François Blondel and became a member of the Académie Royale d'Architecture in 1685. Among his works are the Château de Champs-sur-Marne and the Porte Saint-Martin.

Early life and training

Pierre Bullet's father, Martin Bullet, was a master builder in Paris. At an early age, Pierre Bullet became a student of François Blondel, who was more a theoretician, while Bullet was described as an expert dessinateur et apparailleur.

Architectural work

Bullet directed the construction work of the Porte Saint-Denis, built according to the plans and drawings of Blondel, in 1672. Two years later, in 1674, he provided the plans for the Porte Saint-Martin and directed the work. The French architectural historian Maurice Du Seigneur wrote: "This monument is the most important work that Bullet left us; of less grandiose proportions than the Porte Saint-Denis, the Porte Saint-Martin presents a very remarkable aspect of decorative simplicity."
In 1675, he made the high altar of the church of the Sorbonne, as well as the decoration of the two chapels of the transept of the church of Saint-Germain des Prés.
Between 1676 and 1679, he was in charge of the construction work of the Quai Pelletier; in 1676 he designed a Doric door, to serve as an entrance to the building of the pump on the Pont Notre-Dame.
In 1681, he studied the preliminary project of the church of the general novitiate of the Reformed Dominicans; the first stone of this building was laid on 5 March 1683, and the work continued, under the direction of Bullet, who was not to see his work completed. It was not until 1770 that Brother Claude, a Dominican, built the portal of this church which today bears the name of Saint-Thomas-d'Aquin.
From 1684 to 1687, he had the old Saint-Michel fountain built, now destroyed.
He was admitted to the Royal Academy of Architecture on 23 February 1685.
From 1700 to 1702, he built the and the on Place Vendôme; in 1710, the on Rue de Tournon.
Pierre Bullet was also the architect of a large number of other Parisian hotels, the, rue des Enfants Rouges ; that of the banker Jabach, rue neuve Saint-Merry; the Hôtel Amelot, rue du Grand-Chantier [:fr:Rue du Grand-Chantier|]; and the, rue Culture Sainte-Catherine.
He also designed the Hôtel de Vauvray, rue de Seine. In the 19th century, this Vauvray hotel served as a residence for the director of the Museum of Natural History; its plans and elevation are engraved in volume II of Jacques-François Blondel's Architecture française.
In collaboration with Jacques Gabriel, Bullet had embellishment work carried out in the Hôtel de La Force, ; with the help of Germain Boffrand, he decorated the Hôtel d'Avaux that Pierre Le Muet had built around 1660.
He is also responsible for the construction of the Château d'Issy, for the Princess of Conti, and for the avant-corps of the episcopal palace in Bourges. In the he erected the tomb of Anne de Montmorency. He made notable modifications to the plans of the convent buildings of Saint-Martin-des-Champs.

Publications

Pierre Bullet published an important map of Paris engraved in twelve sheets and which bears the following title: Plan de Paris levé par les ordres du roy et par les soins de messieurs les prévôts des marchands et échevins, en l'année 1676, par le sieur Bullet, architecte du roy et de la ville, sous la conduite de M. Blondel, directeur de l'Académie royale d'architecture, etc.. Alfred Bonnardot, in his Études archéologiques sur les anciens plans de Paris, considers that this vast print is far from being a masterpiece, in terms of engraving and geometric precision, but that it still offers interest to the archaeologist, because one grasps, in a way, the last traces of old Paris, and the last movements of its metamorphosis.
Pierre Bullet also published a Traité sur l'usage du pantomètre, in 1675, and L'Architecture pratique, in 1691.