Vintage French ski cabins up for sale for €500 each
The 30-year-old ‘eggs’ are being sold to individuals and companies alike
The old cabins were installed 30 years ago, and will be replaced by a new, super-modern system
An Instant of Time / Shutterstock
Nostalgic for some French mountain history? Ski cabins from the ski resort of Luchon-Superbagnères in the Pyrénées are being sold for €500 apiece ahead of the station’s planned renovation.
A total of 124 old cabins (télécabines in French, sometimes affectionately called ‘oeufs’ (eggs)) are being sold by Haute-Garonne Montagne, part of the departmental council of Haute-Garonne
The team believes that the 30-year-old cabins may appeal to buyers with a strong nostalgia for their use, such as regular visitors who remember the cabins from their first-ever ski holiday, a couple who first met in the cabins, or even simple collectors looking for a piece of history.
They could be used in people’s gardens to create an unusual seating area or fancy shed, or perhaps even a chicken coop with a difference. They may also be bought by shops and repainted with their logo, or by winter-themed restaurants that could use them in the garden for outdoor seating.
A museum of mechanical mountain lifts, in Taninges in Haute-Savoie, has also expressed an interest.
The cabins are two metres tall and 1.8 metres wide and weigh 200kg.
Anyone interested in purchasing a cabin should email service.travaux@hg-montagne.com to add their name to the reservation list. Individuals are limited to one cabin per household, and are collection-only.
In a press release, the department said: “Due to the limited number of cabins, reservations will be made on a first-come, first-serve basis.
“Buyers must organise pick-up from Superbagnères on the day of collection, with their own vehicle. Haute-Garonne Montagne will load the cabins onto the vehicles (if you bring a trailer) using a lifting device, but no delivery will be possible.”
More than 300 reservation requests have already been received, exceeding the number of cabins available. The department said: “The €500 price does not seem to be putting potential buyers off.”
Residents of the communes surrounding the resort are considered a priority in the allocation system, and have been invited to collect a cabin for free.
The sale comes ahead of the resort’s plans to renovate its ski cabin system, with the installation of a “valley lift”.
This is set to be an ultramodern téléphérique cabin, with the name ‘Crémaillère Express’, in homage to the area’s historic creamery. Téléphériques tend to be larger than télécabines, and carry a lot more people per cabin.
Luchon-Superbagnères is only the latest resort to sell its cabins in recent years. In 2018, Vaujany in Isère (Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes) sold 72 of its old cabins for €290 each, in less than three days. And in 2020, iconic vintage eggs from 1973 were sold at auction in Samoëns, Haute-Savoie.
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