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Chateau de Vaux-le-Vicomte Review

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Château de Vaux-le-Vicomte

Phone: 01-64-14-41-90
www.vaux-le-vicomte.com

Category: Castles/Palaces
Location: Vaux-le-Vicomte

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Fodor's Review:

A manifesto for French 17th-century splendor, the Château de Vaux-le-Vicomte was built between 1656 and 1661 by finance minister Nicolas Fouquet. The construction program was monstrous: entire villages were razed, 18,000 workmen called in, and architect Louis Le Vau, painter Charles Le Brun, and landscape architect André Le Nôtre recruited at vast expense to prove that Fouquet's taste was as refined as his business acumen. The housewarming party was so lavish it had star guest Louis XIV, tetchy at the best of times, spitting jealous curses. He hurled Fouquet in the slammer and set about building Versailles to prove just who was top banana.

The high-roofed château, partially surrounded by a moat, is set well back from the road behind iron railings topped with sculpted heads. A cobbled avenue stretches up to the entrance, and stone steps lead to the vestibule, which seems small given the noble scale of the exterior. Charles Le Brun's captivating decoration includes the ceiling of the Chambre du Roi (Royal Bedchamber), depicting Time Bearing Truth Heavenward, framed by stuccowork by sculptors François Girardon and André Legendre. Along the frieze you can make out small squirrels, the Fouquet family's emblem—squirrels are known as fouquets in local dialect. But Le Brun's masterwork is the ceiling in the Salon des Muses (Hall of Muses), a brilliant allegorical composition painted in glowing, sensuous colors that some feel even surpasses his work at Versailles. On the ground floor the impressive Grand Salon (Great Hall), with its unusual oval form and 16 caryatid pillars symbolizing the months and seasons, has harmony and style even though the ceiling decoration was never finished. The state salons are redolent of le style louisquartorze, thanks to the grand state beds, Mazarin desks, and Baroque marble busts—gathered together by the current owners of the château, the Comte et Comtesse de Vogüé—that replace the original pieces, which Louis XIV trundled off as booty to Versailles. In the basement, whose cool, dim rooms were used to store food and wine and house the château's kitchens, you can find rotating exhibits about the château's past and life-size wax figures illustrating its history, including the notorious 19th-century murder-suicide of two erstwhile owners, the Duc et Duchess de Choiseul-Praslin. The house has been featured in many Hollywood films, including The Man in the Iron Mask, Dangerous Liaisons, and Moonraker.Le Nôtre's carefully restored gardens are at their best when the fountains are turned on (the second and final Saturday of each month from April through October, 3 pm-6 pm).