The Gardens of Versailles

The Versailles gardens, designed by André Le Nôtre, have been a worldwide reference since the 17th century. These works of art are also a paradise representative of the ambitions of Louis XIV when he was a young king.

Versailles before Louis XIV

Before becoming today’s vast domain made up of parks and gardens, Versailles was the hunting grounds for the young Louis XIII and his father, King Henry IV, where a hunting pavilion and later a palace were built. For Louis XIII, the place was not only a refuge where he could enjoy hunting but a place where he could get away from the authority of his mother, Marie de Medici, who would guarantee his ascension to the throne.

André Le Nôtre and The Gardens of the Royal Residence

The work that André Le Nôtre carried out for the Château de Versailles marked not only his career but the history of France. A humble gardener without specialized training, Le Nôtre designed and conceived a series of gardens, groves, and parks for the palace and its domaine. His achievements were, and still are, considered to be the work of a genius and spanned 25 long years during which the gardens of Versailles would continue to grow in size and in splendor.

One must understand the young Sun King’s ambition in order to grasp the plans conceived for gardens of Versailles. Because he sought a world of pleasure and luxury in which he and his court could thrive, the Sun King chose the castle of his father, Louis XIII. Although Jean-Baptiste Colbert, Minister of Finance, wanted to demolish everything, the young King preferred to integrate the old building with the new.

Park and Versailles Garden : the Plan

André Le Nôtre is known for the finesse of his formal flowerbed compositions and for optical illusions without precedent. The use of large, sweeping perspectives allows for impressive panoramas. In reality, however, it’s nearly impossible to see the Versailles domaine all at once, a fact which bears witness to the talent of Le Nôtre. Indeed, thanks to a series of flat parterres the gardens unveil themselves with every step. As a result, as the visitor advances so does the landscape reveal itself slowly but surely, much like the succession of theatre scenes that end up creating a complete story.

Two achievements, the Embroidery parterres and the Grand Canal, have made the name Le Nôtre go down in history.

French-style Gardens of Versailles : the birth of a tradition

Jardins de Vaux le Vicomte, created by Le Nôtre

The embroidery parterre, or a formal flowerbed garden, is a theme specific to French gardening that harks back to a veritable tradition. This type of garden is geometric in nature and traces symmetric, arabesque lawns in front of buildings. There’s no such thing as a French-style garden without an embroidery parterre! Those that currently exist at Versailles are reconstructed ones that date from the 1920s and are therefore not entirely faithful to the originals. Old etchings show that rather than lawns bordered by a hedge of small bushes, as is the case today, parterres were the outlines of lawns traced directly onto gravel.

The Grand Canal, an optical feat

The Grand Canal at the Palace of Versailles is without a doubt André Le Nôtre’s most famous work. The landscape artist’s task was to create a perfect visual harmony. However, the Grand Canal has two lateral canals that are not the same size; one measures 62 meters and the other 80 meters wide. The main bassin in the form of a cross measures 23 hectares. On paper, the cross appears asymmetrical but when the King would arrive at the bassin -- or more specifically at the Latone part of the bassin -- everything appeared perfectly harmonious and symmetrical.

At the time, this technical prowess was the result of a slow-motion optical perspective that initially provides onlookers with the impression that the canal is much larger than it really is. It’s thanks to anamorphose and the use of distorted imagery that the Grand Canal still provides an astonishing visual harmony without equal.