Tom Obry is a history student from Nice. In April 2020, he created the Instagram account @nicestorique where he explains the history of local heritage in a few lines. Overflowing with anecdotes, his account quickly won over the Internet users and now has nearly 10,000 followers. For you, Nice Premium went to meet him and asked him a few questions…
Nice Premium: How did you come up with the idea to create this account?
Tom Obry: The idea came to me a little before the first lockdown, in March 2020… I wanted to share my passion and highlight the richness all around us. We often tend to believe that French cultural heritage is just about Paris whereas the heritage of Nice is just as rich!
NP: Why “Nicestorique”?
TO: It’s a play on words: the history of the city of Nice! I also wanted to pay tribute to Henri Sappia. He created in 1898 one of the oldest periodicals, which still exists today and is called Nice Historique. Ultimately, it’s a way for me to perpetuate this Nice tradition of wanting to uncover the city’s history.
NP: Where do you get your information?
TO: My sources are varied: the internet, a bookshelf at home full to bursting with books, and, being at university, I’m lucky to have a large number of resources at my disposal!
Finally, I regularly visit the municipal and departmental archives and the Cessole Library.
The Cessole Library – “It’s a beautiful place that is very underused and of incredible richness“
NP: You created this account only 2 years ago… Today you already have almost 10,000 followers. How do you explain such success?
TO: I am delighted to see that the people of Nice are interested in our local heritage! Making the history of Nice easily accessible, in a free and fun way, may be what was missing. With my account, I’m simply trying to tell them “look where you’re walking, it’s something beautiful!” and give them the keys to understand their environment.
NP: Do you have any new projects in mind? If so, can you tell us more?
Many projects are coming up, including the opening of a new Instagram account, “Tomhistorique” which will share anecdotes of all kinds, for example: “why do we shake hands to say hello?”.
I also plan to launch on YouTube, which will allow me to address topics in more depth.
Finally, I would love to create sorts of tourist walks to tell the history of the city, but that’s a project which is only in the reflection stage at the moment.
NP: You are now collaborating with the Nice Opera… Can you explain what the project entails?
TO: The Opera contacted me at the beginning of December because they wanted to create a show about its history, and I was immediately very excited about the idea. In doing my research, I realized that its history was incredibly rich, and we created the first episodes to see if the concept was appealing. It is now validated, and we are proposing a mini-series called “Opera stories” that tells little by little the history of the Nice Opera.
