Trianon and the Queen's Hamlet at Versailles

Trianon and the Queen's Hamlet at Versailles
Author: Jacques Moulin
Publisher: Rizzoli Publications
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2019-11-12
Genre: Architecture
ISBN: 2080204106

Exceptional new photography brings readers behind the scenes of the Trianons and Marie Antoinette's Hamlet at Versailles--including areas usually closed to the public. Life in the Château de Versailles was dense with pomp and circumstance, and the royals often craved a quiet moment with friends and lovers far from the din of the court. Hidden away from the palace on the grounds nearby, the kings built the Grand Trianon, Petit Trianon, and the Queen's Hamlet, where they could slip away to entertain their inner circle. This book explores every aspect of life at these private outbuildings, from the furnishings and gardens to the history and inhabitants. In 1687, the sun king Louis XIV conceived of the Grand Trianon and its exceptional parterres and fountains as a seamless link between court and garden--a private retreat where he could withdraw with his family and escape the heavy hand of protocol. Louis XV commissioned the Petit Trianon, a neoclassical masterpiece with four unique facades, its famous menagerie, and botanical gardens. Louis XVI bestowed the Petit Trianon on Marie Antoinette; in her gardens and picturesque hamlet and farm, the queen's presence is more tangible here than anywhere else at Versailles. This handsome volume, with newly commissioned photography, is both a historical testimony and an intimate visit on the grounds of the palace of Versailles.

Versailles: From Louis XIV to Jeff Koons

Versailles: From Louis XIV to Jeff Koons
Author: Catherine Pégard
Publisher: Assouline Publishing
Total Pages: 6
Release: 2020-11-01
Genre: Travel
ISBN: 161428962X

Lavishly illustrated with archival images and beautiful photography, Versailles: From Louis XIV to Jeff Koons features insightful texts by Catherine Pégard, president of the Château de Versailles, with the collaboration of Mathieu da Vinha, scientific director of the Château de Versailles Research Center, revealing all the stories that have unfolded within this glorious monument.

A Day at Versailles

A Day at Versailles
Author: Yves Carlier
Publisher: Flammarion-Pere Castor
Total Pages: 232
Release: 2014-04
Genre: Architecture
ISBN:

The Chateau de Versailles is one of the most beautiful and fascinating achievements of eighteenth-century French art. This unique book offers readers unprecedented access to this historical treasure. The world's most iconic chateau has welcomed tourists the world over, yet this handsome slipcased volume offers up the charm of a thousand and one hidden places in the chateau, its gardens, and pavilions. All were designed to surprise and delight the eye and all the senses at every turn, their ornate decoration forming an integral part of the elite lifestyle of the eighteenth century. This comprehensive volume captures the exquisite setting and inimitable ambience of Versailles and its gardens, from its intimate private spaces usually closed to the general public to the charming Petit Trianon and dairy farm created for the pure pleasure of Marie-Antoinette.

Marie Antoinette and the Last Garden of Versailles

Marie Antoinette and the Last Garden of Versailles
Author: Christian Duvernois
Publisher: Rizzoli International Publications
Total Pages: 232
Release: 2008
Genre: Architecture
ISBN:

Marie-Antoinette has been idolized as the height of eighteenth-century French style and vilified as the spark that ignited the French Revolution. This book departs from such traditional interpretations of the infamous queen’s reign and chooses to reflect on the humanistic aspects of her private realm. To escape the formalities and royal obligations of Louis XVI’s court, Marie-Antoinette created a private realm of pleasure for herself at the Petit Trianon and Hameau, where she planted the first Anglo-Chinese garden; created a trysting grotto; a working farm; and revolutionized architecture and gardening trends for the century to come. Marie-Antoinette’s entire private domain and its story are told in beautiful photographic detail by François Halard for the first time since its recent restoration and accompanied by well-researched texts by garden expert Christian Duvernois.

The Gardener of Versailles

The Gardener of Versailles
Author: Alain Baraton
Publisher: Rizzoli Publications
Total Pages: 294
Release: 2014-02-11
Genre: Gardening
ISBN: 0847842703

An “eccentric and charming” love letter to Versailles Palace and its storied grounds, by the man who knows them best—for gardening lovers and Francophiles (New York Times) Tour Versailles’ 2,100 acres as its gardener-in-chief describes its fascinating history and his 40 years of living and working in the gardens. In Alain Baraton’s Versailles, every grove tells a story. As the gardener-in-chief, Baraton lives on its grounds, and since 1982 he has devoted his life to the gardens, orchards, and fields that were loved by France’s kings and queens as much as the palace itself. His memoir captures the essence of the connection between gardeners and the earth they tend, no matter how humble or grand. With the charm of a natural storyteller, Baraton weaves his own path as a gardener with the life of the Versailles grounds, and his role overseeing its team of 80 gardeners tending to 350,000 trees and 30 miles of walkways across 2,100 acres. He richly evokes this legendary place and the history it has witnessed but also its quieter side that he feels privileged to know: The same gardens that hosted the lavish lawn parties of Louis XIV and the momentous meeting between Marie Antoinette and the Cardinal de Rohan remain enchanted—private places where visitors try to get themselves locked in at night, lovers go looking for secluded hideaways, and elegant grandmothers secretly make cuttings to take back to their own gardens. A tremendous bestseller in France, The Gardener of Versailles gives an unprecedentedly intimate view of one of the grandest places on earth.

From Marie-Antoinette's Garden

From Marie-Antoinette's Garden
Author: Elisabeth De Feudeau
Publisher: Flammarion
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2017-02-07
Genre: Gardens
ISBN: 9782080203120

A horticultural tour of Marie-Antoinette's domain, the lavishly constructed gardens at Versailles, accompanied by eighteenth-century archival illustrations. Plants, flowers, and trees were Marie-Antoinette's passion; she transformed the Petit Trianon's gardens into an enchanted escape from the oppressive shackles of Versailles. Based on archival documents, this book meanders through Marie-Antoinette's estate as the queen herself would have walked it: traversing hyacinths, buttercups, and anemones in the French Gardens, via winding paths in the Anglo-Chinese Gardens, through the conifers of the Belvedere Gardens--where fabulous nocturnal parties were hosted--past the entrancing aromas of the shrubs surrounding the Temple of Love, to the wildflowers of the Garden of Solitude.

Queen of Fashion

Queen of Fashion
Author: Caroline Weber
Publisher: Macmillan + ORM
Total Pages: 452
Release: 2007-10-02
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 1429936479

In this dazzling new vision of the ever-fascinating queen, a dynamic young historian reveals how Marie Antoinette's bold attempts to reshape royal fashion changed the future of France Marie Antoinette has always stood as an icon of supreme style, but surprisingly none of her biographers have paid sustained attention to her clothes. In Queen of Fashion, Caroline Weber shows how Marie Antoinette developed her reputation for fashionable excess, and explains through lively, illuminating new research the political controversies that her clothing provoked. Weber surveys Marie Antoinette's "Revolution in Dress," covering each phase of the queen's tumultuous life, beginning with the young girl, struggling to survive Versailles's rigid traditions of royal glamour (twelve-foot-wide hoopskirts, whalebone corsets that crushed her organs). As queen, Marie Antoinette used stunning, often extreme costumes to project an image of power and wage war against her enemies. Gradually, however, she began to lose her hold on the French when she started to adopt "unqueenly" outfits (the provocative chemise) that, surprisingly, would be adopted by the revolutionaries who executed her. Weber's queen is sublime, human, and surprising: a sometimes courageous monarch unwilling to allow others to determine her destiny. The paradox of her tragic story, according to Weber, is that fashion—the vehicle she used to secure her triumphs—was also the means of her undoing. Weber's book is not only a stylish and original addition to Marie Antoinette scholarship, but also a moving, revelatory reinterpretation of one of history's most controversial figures.

Palace of Versailles

Palace of Versailles
Author: Jennifer Howse
Publisher: Castles of the World
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2015
Genre: Juvenile Nonfiction
ISBN: 9781489634009

The opulent Palace of Versailles became the official royal residence of French monarchs during the reign of King Louis XIV. With 551,112 square feet (51,200 square meters) of floor space, rooms filled with gilded furniture, and more than 7,000 works of art, the Palace of Versailles showcases the luxurious lifestyles of the kings of France. Explore the facility, history, people, and science behind the building in Palace of Versailles, a Castles of the World book.

Fashion and Versailles

Fashion and Versailles
Author: Laurence Benaïm
Publisher: Rizzoli Publications
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2018-02-06
Genre: Design
ISBN: 2080203355

The Château de Versailles—the indisputable birthplace of fashion—continues to inspire glamour and style today. The royal residence of Versailles—this unparalleled seat of power and seduction—is an important influence on contemporary fashion, inspiring passions and vocations. Since the establishment of the world’s first dress codes under the rule of Louis XIV to incite the whims of the queens and royal mistresses, fashion at Versailles has been a constant and inexhaustible source of inspiration for designers, photographers, decorators, and directors and has launched countless fashion revolutions. Courtesan Madame de Montespan launched the “innocente” robe to camouflage pregnancy, Sofia Coppola memorialized Marie-Antoinette in extravagant wigs and pastel hues, and Annie Leibovitz captured Kirsten Dunst in a delicate taffeta-and-chiffon Alexander McQueen gown against the dramatic backdrop of a peristyle at Versailles. Haute couture in the 1950s launched the cinched-waist “neo-trianon” trend. Karl Lagerfeld used the château’s gardens as the runway for his 2013 cruise collection featuring Versailles-influenced crinoline dresses and brocade jackets. This stunning volume showcases the best of fashion inspired by Versailles, set against the exquisite background of the most spectacular palace in the world.