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Memories of France ~ Chateaux interiors
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Tag Archives: Loire Valley
Chateaux of the Loire – Day Three: Chateau Chaumont-sur-Loire
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This is the third of nine posts about our visits to Loire chateaux this summer. Chaumont was distinctive for its annual International Garden Festival and a lovely lunch at Le Grand Velum which features spices, vegetable species, rare and relevant plants from eco-agriculture.
Less than 200 km south of Paris, nestling between the cities of Tours and Blois, is a haven of poetry stretching out 40 meters above the wild Loire, Whatever the season, Chaumont-sur-Loire, once the home of Catherine de Medici, Diane de Poitiers and Princess de Broglie, beckons visitors indoors to admire its cozy and lavishly furnished interior. Installations by an array of contemporary artists in the château and along the footpaths of the park catch you by surprise. Every year, more than 400,000 visitors flock to its International Garden Festival, held since 1992.
Our photos include the chateau itself with all its elegance and grandeur on the banks of the Loire, its fabled stables, its unusual eco-friendly restaurant, and, of course, the Garden Festival
Catherine de Medici’s bedroom in her usual somber hues
Modern stained glass art installation in attic niches filled with restoration materials
Grand dining room
Huge stables filled with carriages and harnesses
The chateau’s floral borders
Garden Festival entry portraying top of home sunken by nature’s forces in this future themed competeition
All that is left is the attic with the survivor’s few precious belongings
Parfumery entry.
Another unusual entry
Look closely for Maggie popping up in this one
And on to lunch at Le Grand Velum
Cushion of veal cooked like a boiled ham, with grilled bacon from the same meat, seasoned with lovage. Heads of broccoli and duxelles of finely sliced chard served on home-made wholegrain bread roll
Beef eye-of-round and Carrots cooked in mild
“ices (Voatsiperifery pepper, paprika and turmeric), cumin potato bubbles and saffron
yellow zucchini, beef gravy and cress shoots
Milk chocolate and pollen flavoured
streusel biscuit, organic honey parfait, served with a smooth peach-apricot cream.
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Chateaux of the Loire – Day One: Chateau Villesavin
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This summer I spent three lovely weeks in Orléans with my daughter and granddaughters, ages four and six. During the week, the little girls, who are bilingual in French, attended a Centre Loisirs pour les enfants (see news photos here) … Continue reading
Beautiful bits of flotsam and jetsam
Very often it’s not the grand vistas but the intricate details that are most remembered from our travels. Enjoy this array of exquisite bits of flotsam and jetsam from my travels in England and France.
A swan at Versailles
The “Thinker” gargoyle at Notre Dame
Two gargoyles’ view of Paris
Chenonceau through a window
The kitchen at Chenonceau
Drain pipe at Chambord
Opera costumes at Chambord
Egyptian cats at the Louvre
MIniatures of Paris in shop on Ile St. Louis
Pont D’Alexandre Paris
Buckingham Palace
Near Buckingham Palace
And ending on a yummy note…the Albert Pub in London. See you there!
A Rainbow of Color ~ Spring in France
From the flower market on Île de la Cité to Le Tour Eiffel peaking through the trees to the irises at a bed and breakfast in Amboise to pink tulips in the garden at Chenonceau and its wisteria covered cottage to a colorful array of tulips behind Notre Dame to touches of color at Villandry to the spring green of the cloisters at Mont Saint-Michel and, finally, to the sacred grounds of Normandy.
Chenonceau ~ The Chateau of the Dueling Gardens
I have visited Chenonceau three times. The first time with my daughter in the dead of winter. I was doing my motherly “duty” and visiting her during her first year of living abroad in France. The program that was to help her find a job didn’t work out and she was on her own, finding both friends and employment. We spent over a week staying in three different chateaux and visiting many of the rest.
But Chenonceau always stuck in my mind with its graceful arched bridge spanning the River Cher. It was commissioned by Diane de Poitiers, the mistress of Henry II in 1555 who also oversaw the planting of extensive flower and vegetable gardens. Set along the banks of the river, but buttressed from flooding by stone terraces, the exquisite gardens were laid out in four triangles.
After King Henry II died in 1559, his strong-willed widow Catherine de’Medici and forced Diane to exchange it for the Château Chaumont and made Chenonceau her own favorite residence, adding a new series of gardens. Only is France will women complete over the same man with dueling gardens!
Exploring Chambord
I have visited the magnificent 16th century Chateau of Chambord three times but my first visit was in November 1999 with my daughter, who was just into her first year of living in France after college. With the majority of tourists off to warmer climes, we often found ourselves alone in the 130 rooms open to visitors.
And, yes, we visited them all, reaching the various floors by walking up the double-helix marble staircase supposedly inspired by Leonardo da Vinci. I loved placing each foot in the shallow spots worn away by centuries of royal occupants climbing up and down as they plotted murders and bandied about with mistresses.
The roof top with all its minarets and spires is every bit as mysterious in person as it looks in photos. Author Henry James remarked that Chambord’s “towers, cupolas, the gables, the lanterns, the chimneys, look more like the spires of a city than the salient points of a single building.
Driving down the tree-lined avenue leading away from the chateau, a wild boar came out of the mists and stopped momentarily in the middle of the road ahead of us. How magical.
A later visit in 2009 brought the additional surprise of dozens of mannequins dressed in opera costumes posed throughout the interior.
Dubbed as “Alain Germain dresses the Chambord’s opera,” costumes from renowned couturiers, such as Franck Sorbier, Nathalie Germain, Pascal Bordet, and Olivier Bériot, were displayed within the castle. 
Breathtaking!
Dr. Karen Stephen aka Doc Flamingo 