The Hotel Legouz de Gerland had been built during the sixteenth century by the family Chissey-Varange, to which we owe the three delightful little projecting towers or oriels which overlook the rue Liégeard. In 1586, Guillaume Legouz became avocat général to the parlement. He supported the league, but finally had to accept Henry IV as king. His grandson, Pierre Legouz-Morin, became the owner of this hotel. On 5 February 1672 he put in an application to the Chambre de Ville to bring forward the façade of his house and also to construct a cabinet in the form of a corbel at the extremity of the house.
Pierre's son Charles married Constance de Cirey. Their son, Bénigne, was a great lover of the arts and travelled in Italy and England. He gave Dijon its Jardin Botanique and its Academy with a Cabinet d'Histoire Naturelle. Together with François Devosge he established the Ecole des Beaux-Arts.

Charles Legouz de Gerland made considerable additions to his house, building the spacious courtyard on the west side, towards the rue Vauban. With its elegant, arcaded hemicycle surmonted by a balustrade and urns and its handsome porte cochère, it set a new style which was to reach its zenith in the building of the Hotel Bouhier de Lantenay in the eighteenth century.