Villandry

Villandri Castle is one of the most beautiful castles of the Loire River Valley, known for its beautiful gardens, pond, ornamental gardens.

In place of the castle of Willandri, a well-fortified fortress of Colombier used to be located. In it, on July 4, 1189, King Philip-August of France and King of England Henry II Plantagenet signed a peace treaty. Centuries later, the fortress was transferred to the property of Jean le Breton, who at that time served as secretary of the king of France. In 1536, he began the restructuring of the fortress. All old buildings were demolished, only the dongjon left. The new building was built in the form of the letter P. In 1754, after being bought by the new owner, the castle was decorated with arches, attached balconies, instead of columns they built new rooms and a kitchen. In the 19th century, the owner of the castle was Jerome - the brother of Napoleon. At this time, the castle became immerally rich.

In 1906, Joaquim Carvalho and his wife acquired the castle. They were great connoisseurs of art and wanted to return the castle of Willandri to its original appearance, as well as restore the gardens. Later, Carvalho created an association of owners of historical monuments to allow everyone to visit the palaces and castles of the Loire River Valley.

The Willelandri Castle is made in the spirit of the Renaissance, and in general, elements characteristic of castles of the 16th century are visible: auditory windows, huge windows with fireplaces and capitals, friezes. In the castle you can see almost all the rooms. From each room you can see a huge garden, divided into 3 levels. Jean le Breton took the idea of creating gardens from Italy, where he worked as an ambassador. Later, such gardens appeared in France. So stone fences, replaced by hedges from a cut shrub, disappeared from French gardens.

The boundaries of the garden and alleys were framed by numerous flower beds. The upper level of the garden is a "water garden" with a pond from which water is taken for the operation of fountains and for watering the main garden. On the second level are 3 thematic gardens: a garden of love, music and medicinal plants. Amazing patterns have been created in the garden of love from flowers, symbolizing 4 types of love: tragic, passionate, tender and unstable. Flowers are selected so that shrubs and flowers bloom all year round in the gardens of Villandri Castle. In total, with vegetables in gardens more than 250 thousand plants. The third level of gardens is a garden of 1.2 hectares, consisting of 9 equal squares. The plots are planted so that the garden looks like a multi-colored chessboard. Fruit trees in the garden form the boundaries of the plots.

Visits to Willandri Castle will be interesting to many. Flower festivals are regularly held here.