Jean de Bernuy, a Spanish Jew who fled from the Inquisition, became a rich merchant thanks to the trade in woad, a plant which gives an indelible blue dye. In the XVIth century he had this fine Renaissance-style residence built by the architect Louis Privat.

This magnificent mansion possesses the tallest octagonal staircase in Toulouse, and is today home to a part of the Lycée and Collège Pierre de Fermat.