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The Gardens of Versailles (French: Jardins du château de Versailles [ʒaʁdɛ̃ dy ʃɑto d (ə) vɛʁsɑj]) occupy part of what was once the Domaine royal de Versailles, the royal demesne of the château of Versailles. Situated to the west of the palace, the gardens cover some 800 hectares of land, much of which is landscaped in the classic ...
Oct 5, 2024 · The gardens have always been central to the full experience of Versailles. Louis XIV, even wrote a manual, How to show the gardens of Versailles (c. 1689–1705), which outlined his version of a ...
- Queen's Grove
- Ballroom Grove
- Girandole Grove
- Colonnade Grove
- Chestnut Grove
- Grove of The Domes
- Enceladus Grove
- Obelisk Grove
- Apollo's Baths Grove
- Star Grove
This grove replaced the famous Labyrinth grove, installed in 1665-1666 and enhanced in 1677 with a series of thirty-nine painted lead fountains in a lifelike representation of the animals in Aesop's fables. This wonder was destroyed when the gardens were replanted in 1775-1776 and replaced by today's grove, initially called Venus's Grove and later ...
The Ballroom Grove was the last grove to be laid out in the gardens by Le Nôtre. The works began in 1680 and were completed in 1685. The Grand Dauphin, the son of Louis XIV, organised a great dinner there to celebrate its inauguration. The grove was designed as an amphitheatre of greenery. The central arena had a small island surrounded by a canal ...
Along with the Dauphin's Grove, its corresponding grove to the north, the Girandole Grove was one of the first groves to be laid out by Le Nôtre in 1663. Designed as green bowers, each has a central chamber adorned with a fountain installed in 1669. To the south, the border of the pool was decorated in 1682 with a reed motif: water jets converged t...
Commenced in 1685 by Jules Hardouin-Mansart, the Colonnade replaced the Spring Grove created by Le Nôtre in 1679. A circular peristyle with a diameter of forty metres is supported by thirty-two pilasters that act as buttresses for the arcades supporting thirty-two Ionic columns. The pilasters are all made of Languedoc marble, while the columns alte...
The layout of the Chestnut Grove resembles a verdant gallery adorned with a fountain at each end. It replaced a grove designed by Le Nôtre in 1678: the Ancient gallery, where in 1680 Louis XIV ordered a remarkable collection of ancient sculptures or sculptures modelled on ancient sculptures to be positioned on pedestals rising out of the canal surr...
This grove was frequently refashioned and its name changed as the decor was modified. Created by Le Nôtre in 1675, it has an amphitheatre design with the central arena occupied by a hexagonal pool surrounded by a golden metal balustrade adorned with eighteen pillars, each projecting water that gushes into the pool. Higher up, the amphitheatre is ci...
The Enceladus Fountain was made of lead by Gaspard MarsyThe Marsy brothers, Gaspard (1624-1681) and Balthasar (1628-1674), were french sculptors. They worked a lot for the Gardens of Versailles ...between 1675 and 1677. The subject is borrowed from the fall of the Titans, buried under the rocks of Olympus by the gods they had wished to dethrone. Th...
The general outline is all that remains of the Feasting Chamber Grove laid out by Le Nôtre between 1671 and 1674 and completely redesigned by Jules Hardouin-Mansart in 1705-1706. The architect installed a vast rectangular pool on two levels with a multitude of jets forming a liquid obelisk. The upper pool tumbled through four cascading stairways in...
Today's Apollo's Baths Grove dates from the reign of Louis XVI and was laid out between 1778 and 1781. In the same location, Le Nôtre initially installed the picturesque Marsh Grove in 1670, its principal decoration consisting of a pool bordered by lifelike painted metal reeds and adorned in its centre by a metal tree with a fountain springing from...
The Star Grove, laid out in 1666, took its name from its shape, one of the most complex in the garden. It was reached by four pathways leading from the corners of the surrounding woods. These pathways led to a circular walkway surrounding the grove, from which only two meandering paths led further inward. These paths led in turn to a new pathway in...
The Palace of Versailles is a royal château in Versailles, Yvelines, in the Île-de-France region of France. When the château was built, Versailles was a country village; today, however, it is a suburb of Paris, some 20 kilometres southwest of the French capital. The court of Versailles was the centre of political power in France from 1682 ...
In 1661 Louis XIV entrusted André Le Nôtre with the creation and renovation of the gardens of Versailles, which he considered just as important as the Palace. Work on the gardens was started at the same time as the work on the palace and lasted for 40 or so years. During this time André Le Nôtre collaborated with the likes of Jean-Baptiste ...
Jan 13, 2023 · Hemis/Alamy. The hidden history of Versailles (Credit: Hemis/Alamy) Louis XIV's iconic "bachelor pad" is one of the most-visited palaces in the world. But to understand his vision for the place ...
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The future Louis XIV first came to Versailles in October 1641, when his father Louis XIII sent him and his brother here to escape a smallpox epidemic that had reached the Palace of Saint-Germain-en-Laye. He was just three years old and it is doubtful that he remembered this first visit; his next known visit was in 1651, when, now Louis XIV, he ...
