Les Buissonnets
Les Buissonnets is the house Louis Martin rented in November 1877, weeks after his wife Zélie died in Alençon, and where Thérèse lived from the age of four until she entered the Carmel at fifteen. It has been shown to pilgrims since 1931.
- Location
- Lisieux, France
- 49.1510° N · 0.2293° E
- Type
- Pilgrimage
- A nineteenth-century Norman house of brick and render, set in its own garden
- Dedication
- Not a church; the Martin family home
The House on the Hill
Every other place in Lisieux shows you Thérèse after she had become someone. This one shows the eleven years before. She called it her sweet childhood nest, and she also called this the most painful period of her life, and both are true: it is the house where she was loved, and the house she watched her sisters leave one by one for the Carmel. If you want to understand the Little Way, it starts in these rooms rather than in the basilica.
Eleven Years
Zélie Martin died in Alençon in August 1877. Louis moved the family north to Lisieux that November, to be near Zélie's brother and his wife, and rented this house on the road out toward Pont-l'Évêque. Thérèse was four. She lived here until April 9, 1888, when she left at fifteen to enter the Carmel in the town below. Three moments in her own account happened inside these walls or in the garden: the healing she attributed to the smile of the Virgin on May 13, 1883, when she was ten; the Christmas night of 1886 when, coming home from midnight Mass at the cathedral, she found herself changed and afterwards called it her complete conversion; and Pentecost 1887, when she asked her father in the garden for permission to enter Carmel and he gave it. A community of Oblate sisters has welcomed pilgrims here since 1931.
An ordinary Norman house of the period, comfortable rather than grand, set back in a walled garden on rising ground above the town. Its ordinariness is the point.
Spiritual Significance
This is a house rather than a church, and pilgrims are shown round it rather than left to pray in it. What it offers is not an atmosphere of prayer but a scale: small rooms, a family table, a garden. It makes the rest of Lisieux legible.
Do Not Miss
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01
The dining room
The family ate here on the day of her First Communion in May 1884, and again on her last evening at home before she entered the Carmel.
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02
Her bedroom
The room where, on May 13, 1883, the ten-year-old Thérèse was healed of a grave illness. She described it all her life as the smile of the Virgin.
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03
The fireplace
Associated with the Christmas night of 1886. She came home from midnight Mass at the cathedral, expected the childish ritual of shoes by the hearth, overheard her father's weariness with it, and instead of weeping found herself changed. She called it her complete conversion.
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04
The garden
At Pentecost 1887 she asked her father here for permission to enter Carmel at fifteen. He picked a small white flower with its root intact and gave it to her, and she kept the image for the rest of her life.
See all 4 · 1 more
- The garden At Pentecost 1887 she asked her father here for permission to enter Carmel at fifteen. He picked a small white flower with its root intact and gave it to her, and she kept the image for the rest of her life.
How to Visit
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Not a place of Mass; a house shown to pilgrims
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Welcomed by a community of Oblate sisters since 1931
Open most days, and closed on Sunday mornings.
- Entry
- By donation, which maintains the house
- Closed
- Sunday mornings, August 15, December 25, January 1
- Typical hours
- Roughly 10:00 to 16:00 in winter, later with a midday break in summer
- Getting there
- About 20 minutes uphill on foot from the station
Visiting
The house opens daily except on Sunday mornings and a small number of feast days. Hours run roughly from ten in the morning to four in the afternoon in winter, and to six in spring and summer with a break over the middle of the day.
- It is closed on August 15, December 25 and January 1.
Pilgrims are shown through the rooms rather than left to wander. A guided pilgrimage covering the basilica, Les Buissonnets, the cathedral and the Carmel runs daily in July and August from the basilica.
- Groups should arrange their visit with the sanctuary in advance.
Access
The house stands on rising ground north of the town center. From the station it is about twenty minutes on foot and uphill for most of it.
- A taxi removes the climb and is short.
- There are stairs inside the house between floors.
Relics, Tombs, Sacred Objects
Tomb and Burial
- No one is buried here. This is a house, not a shrine church.
Relics and Sacred Tradition
- The house preserves furniture, objects and rooms associated with the Martin family rather than bodily relics. Some pieces are original to the family and some are of the period; the sanctuary is the authority on which is which.
Sacred Objects
- The dining room, where the family ate together on the day of her First Communion and on her last evening at home.
- The bedroom associated with her healing on May 13, 1883, which she described as the smile of the Virgin.
- The kitchen fireplace, associated with the Christmas night of 1886 that she called her complete conversion.
- The garden statue where, at Pentecost 1887, she asked her father's permission to enter Carmel at fifteen.
Connected Saints
- Saint Louis Martin Where he raised his daughters after 1877 The house Louis rented in November 1877, weeks after Zélie died, and where he raised the five surviving daughters. It was here, in the garden at Pentecost 1887, that he gave Thérèse permission to enter Carmel at fifteen.
- Saint Thérèse of Lisieux Her home from four years old until she entered Carmel Thérèse Martin lived in this house from November 1877, when her father brought the family north after Zélie's death, until April 9, 1888, when she left at fifteen for the Carmel in the town below. She called it her sweet childhood nest and also the most painful period of her life.
The rest of Theresian Lisieux
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City hub
Lisieux
Where this church sits within the wider Catholic geography of Lisieux.
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Former cathedral
Cathédrale Saint-Pierre de Lisieux
The parish church the family walked to every Sunday, and where she made her first confession.
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Carmelite monastery
Carmel de Lisieux
The monastery she left this house for, and where her relics rest.
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Pilgrimage basilica
Basilique Sainte-Thérèse de Lisieux
Raised after her canonization, and holding the relics of the parents who lived in this house.
Map
Written from the Sanctuary of Lisieux site, which administers the house, and from Thérèse's own account in Story of a Soul, with the Wikimedia image provenance given in the credits. Rooms and objects are described as the sanctuary describes them.
August 5, 2026
Photo credits
- Hero. Photo: Nono vlf, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons. Source. CC BY-SA 4.0.