A recognisable façade.
The first connection with the past is a postcard. It shows a five-bay façade, arched openings, the gateway and the corner statue. Compared with the house today, these details make the building recognisable.
This identification relies on comparing the images. Above all, the card bears a valuable inscription: “Kaiserliches Postamt”, the imperial post office. It preserves evidence of the house’s postal use long before we arrived.
View the postcard’s provenance · The photograph’s date is not established. The colour reproduction appears in Patavic’s article cited beneath the image.
The house in the history of Moselle.
The German inscription and the name “Wich in Lothringen” place this image within the history of changing borders. The Treaty of Frankfurt of 10 May 1871 confirmed the annexation of Alsace and present-day Moselle by the German Empire. The imperial sign belongs to this historical context. Departmental Archives of Meurthe-et-Moselle
On the postcard, the post office stands along the street between neighbouring houses. The façade is already recognisable, but the building has a very different use. The image shows its connection with the postal service; it does not establish when the office opened there.
Another view of the neighbourhood.
A second postcard shows soldiers, bags and a horse-drawn vehicle. It evokes the Feldpost, the German military postal service. In a discussion published in June 2013, collectors place the scene in Vic-sur-Seille near a building neighbouring the post office, and report a postcard dated 18 April 1916. Read the identification discussion
This scene widens our view to the neighbourhood and its activity during the First World War. It accompanies the history of the place without providing a confirmed view of our house’s façade. The postcard’s date also cannot establish exactly when the photograph was taken.
Other views of the former post office
These two postcards show the façade from different viewpoints. The gateway, windows and people give a sense of the office’s place in the street.
From the old office to the municipal postal agency.
More recent documents tell another story: changes to the town’s postal service. In December 2004, Vic-sur-Seille appeared in a question by Jean-Louis Masson to the Senate about the future of Moselle’s post offices. In March 2005, the ministerial reply presented municipal agencies as one way to maintain service. This debate preceded the local reorganisation; it does not establish the office’s closure date. Senate question and reply
On 29 August 2018, Grain de Sel reported the opening of a public services centre in Vic-sur-Seille. The article referred to the disappearance of the old office and announced a postal agency for 3 September. The service changed location and organisation. Grain de Sel, 29 August 2018
Today, the municipal postal agency is at the town hall on place Philippe-Leroy. The former post office retains a visible reminder of its past on the courtyard side: the “Télégraphe · Poste · Téléphone · Vic-sur-Seille” sign. La Poste on the municipal website · La Poste directory
From the former post office to our home.
We bought the building in 2022. It marked the beginning of La Villa de Vic, our life in this house and a renovation that continues through successive projects.
The façade, gateway, stone and spaces give the place its character. Renovating this house means working with that historic presence while adapting the rooms for life today. The renovation is now part of its history.
The rediscovered postcards give the renovation photographs another layer of meaning. Looking at the house, I can also place it within an old image in which its name and purpose were different. The place changing here has already known other uses.
I share this new chapter through the projects, renovation choices and images of our everyday life. La Villa de Vic is the name of this adventure, and this website records it.