The Smoking Museum was opened in 2001 by Michka Seeliger and Tigrane Hadengue. It brings together plants, works of art and objects revolving around an age-old habit: smoking. Reflecting the development of human behaviour throughout the centuries, the thought-provoking collections tell the story of smoking which started with Christopher Columbus and went worldwide in five centuries.
The museum contains all kinds of smoking artefacts from other times and other places. They include, among others, a couple of fragile 17th-century clay pipes or ornate copper ones once worn on the belts of Chinese dignitaries for smoking opium; or long leaves of tobacco drying, 17 centimetres apart just like in the Périgord region; cigar moulds and snuffboxes, a Sioux peace pipe and Tibetan lighters, etc. (See attached inventory.)
The museum also displays a range of engravings, dating from 17th to 20th centuries, by Gavarni, Martinet, Pia, Valerio, Cheret, Gérôme and others.
The plantarium or grow-room, a closed-in space reproducing ideal growing conditions, enables an overview of tobacco plants in all seasons, from seedlings to maturity.

From September 2008, an A to Z presentation of the permanent collection provides a clearer and more pedagogical visit: 26 themes with illustrations and text gives a panorama of the Smoker through the centuries and in different cultures.