Château De Villandry Tickets

The three-hectare wooded area is elevated above the garden level and enclosed by walls. It's a nice place to take a stroll and you get a unique perspective on the gardens from up here, looking down on them through the foliage. At Villandry, the wood best illustrates how untamed nature contrasts with the gardens' supremely domesticated environment. In 2003, it was improved with the addition of a wooden belvedere, which is accessed via a challenging but enchanting path hidden amongst the trees.

The maze at Villandry, also known as a labyrinth, is made up of hornbeam hedges (charmilles) and is located on the second terrace which is part of the Château de Villandry tarif. It was inspired by the intricate labyrinths featured in Renaissance garden layouts. There is an allusion to Daedalus's Labyrinth, which he constructed to hide the Minotaur, but this one is not quite the same. Men would get disoriented in the Greek Labyrinth's maze of traps and dead ends, and they'd spend an eternity trying to find their way out. However, the Renaissance hedge maze was designed in a Christian spirit as a place of progress, with the path taken by the walker representing the development of one's life and the encounter with God at the maze's elevated center. It's right next to the playground, actually. It's close to the playground, actually.

Villandry's gardens are located right next to the chateau's exterior walls. All together, there are three distinct gardens—the Kitchen Garden, the Water Garden, and the Ornamental Garden—scattered across the property's three distinct levels. The Ornamental Garden included in Château de Villandry tarif is sectioned off into greenery-themed salons that act as an outdoor continuation of the interior parlors. These gardens were created by the Sevillian artist Lozano with the help of the painters and landscape architects Javier de Winthuysen.

The Ornamental Garden at the Chateau of Villandry is laid out on the second terrace between the Kitchen Garden and the Water Garden as an extension of the salons. A canal separates the Ornamental Garden's First Salon from the Second Salon, both of which are filled with plants. It was the Sevillian artist Lozano and the Dutch painter and landscape architect Javier de Winthuysen who worked together on the Renaissance design of this section of the Villandry gardens; Joachim Carvallo was responsible for the layout of the adjacent Second Salon. These salons' parterre designs are unmistakably influenced by Andalusian aesthetics which you can view as part of the Château de Villandry tarif.

Located on the property's southern edge, the "Audience" is a small neoclassical pavilion with a slate roof that was constructed in the 18th century by the Marquis of Castellane. The French formal gardens ("jardins à la française") of the 18th century often featured these kinds of ornamental structures, known as fabriques. The Marquis would "grant an audience" to the peasants and farmers who toiled on his estates in this picturesque structure. In 2004, it underwent a complete makeover.

The Water Garden is located far to the south of the estate, above the Ornamental Garden. It is a sunken garden, or boulingrin, surrounded by grassy banks called glacis and featuring a central ornamental pond shaped like a Louis XV mirror and surrounded by square parterres of lawn, a network of perpendicular avenues, and four secondary ornamental ponds. Current-day Water Garden structures were put in place in the early 20th century but the classical ornamental pond was demolished and a new, more organic pond was built during the 19th-century renovation of the grounds in the romantic English style.

About a hectare in size, this section of the lower garden is divided into nine equal squares, each of which contains beds of plants displaying a different color palette from 100s of flowers and vegetables. The monks of an abbey in the Middle Ages started the practice of growing food in formal kitchen gardens laid out in geometric patterns. It was during World War One that the vegetable garden was established in order to meet the dietary needs of the hospitalized patients who were staying in the castle. Since their primary function has been replaced by ornamentation, vegetable and flower plantings are done twice yearly, in the spring and the summer. The autumn season is ideal for appreciating the vibrant hues of crimson cabbages, orange pumpkins, and blue leeks.

Located in the southern part of the estate, the Audience is a small neoclassical-style pavilion with a thatched ardoise roof that was built in the eighteenth century by the marquis of Castellane. This decorative structure, also known as a "fabric," was commonly used in French-style gardens designed in the eighteenth century. The farmers and country folk who worked the marquis's land were often given audience in this charming building. In 2004, he underwent a complete renovation.

The town of Villandry is charming in its own right. Villandry is a nice village that's worth visiting for its Romanesque church and quaint 15th-century houses lining the narrow streets. Stéphanie Oudinot, the wife of the then-owner of the castle, Baron Hainguerlot, donated a beautiful tribune organ to the church of Saint Etienne, which dates back to the eleventh and twelfth centuries. Joachim Carvallo, who died in 1936, was buried in the same church where he was baptized.