Nicolas de Pigage was born on 2 August 1723 in Lunéville, Lorraine, Schwetzingen's French twin town. He trained as an architect at the Académie Royale d'Architecture in Paris. Pigage's work at the Electoral Palatinate Court began in 1749 with his appointment as "Intendant dero Gärthen und Wasserkünsten". Due to his merits in the redesign of the Mannheim and Schwetzingen residences, he was appointed Chief Architect of the Electoral Palatinate in 1752, and later Court Chamber Councillor and Garden Director. He received a special honour when he was elevated to hereditary nobility.
While he completed the residential palace in Mannheim and created a new summer palace in Benrath near Düsseldorf, he was responsible for numerous buildings in Schwetzingen. Thus, the famous palace theatre, the southern circle house and, in the course of his planned extension of the garden, the orangery, the bathhouse complex, the temple buildings and the garden mosque, unique in garden art, were built. He achieved technical masterpieces with the Upper and Lower Waterworks for the water arts in the palace garden. The Catholic Church of St. Pancras also bears his signature with its classicist west façade.
Nicolas de Pigage died on 30 July 1796 in his flat in the "Schwetzinger Gesandtenhaus", today's local court.
