The most incredible castles of France

There are a mind-boggling 40,000 castles in France. Visit one a day and it would take you a staggering 110 years to see them all. Here we look at the most incredible castles of France – the oldest, the biggest, the most haunted and other chateaux in France that have amazing tales to tell. As well as castles that make you stop in your tracks with their dazzling beauty.

Chateau Vaux-le-Vicomte

The Chateau of Vaux-le-Vicomte is in Ile de France, about 55km from the centre of Paris. It is the largest private residence in France, owned by the de Vogüé family. Not only is it exquisitely beautiful but it has the most amazing story of passion, betrayal, corruption, and tragedy. It’s a story which shaped the history of France. You feel it in the kitchens with their gleaming copper pans, in the beautifully furnished rooms with their paintings and tapestries and gilded this and that, in the gardens which look as they had when Le Notre, later Louis XIV’s favourite gardener designed them. There is an echo of the past here and you can’t avoid it.

Enter those grand gates and climb the stairs in front of the huge courtyard, and there 352 years ago stood the proud creator of the castle, a man called Nicolas Fouquet, waiting to welcome his King on a visit. It was 17 August 1661, a sweltering hot day. Fouquet had served Louis XIV well and loyally as Minister of Finances, and that night he hoped to wow his King by entertaining him in great style.

Fouquet had brought together three greats from French history, Le Vau – the architect, le Brun – the painter, and le Notre the gardener. For the first time, a property was built when both the look of the home and the garden had been considered as a whole package. It wasn’t just fabulous, it was dazzling.

The chateau that made a king jealous

The chateau took 20 years to create. And we now know it pretty much bankrupted Fouquet, but he was a man obsessed, everything had to be right. The night the King came, it wasn’t quite finished. Painters of ceilings and walls downed tools, masons carving statues swept up and made everything look as good as it could and got out of the way before the king arrived. Even unfinished, the result was stupendous.

The King’s carriage swept into the courtyard, he alighted and stood at the bottom of the stairs looking up at Fouquet above him on the stairs beaming, proud of his achievement, quite possibly the most beautiful castle in all of France. The fate of the minister and the chateau was sealed in that moment. Never again would anyone stand higher than Louis XIV or have a chateau more beautiful than his.

Instead of staying the night in the suite of rooms designed especially for him, with a view of a giant crown in a lake, which he was supposed to see upon waking next morning, the king cut short his visit. Though he enjoyed dinner cooked by the great French cook Vatel, he then travelled to his own chateau of Fontainebleau, a journey of three hours by horse and carriage.

Resentful of Fouquet’s opulent display of wealth, incensed at being left at the bottom of the stairs, listening to the whispers of those who sought to remove Fouquet from his position of trusted advisor, the 21-year-old king had his minister arrested just two weeks later, 5 September 1661.

Louis took everything in the Chateau. The furniture, paintings, tapestries, ornaments, beds and even the orange trees in their pots in the garden. He also took Le Vau, Le Brun and Le Notre and commanded them to help him turn Versailles, then a glorified hunting lodge, into something even more opulent than Vaux-le-Vicomte.

Meanwhile poor Fouquet went through a show trial, accused of swindling his royal master. Crooked witnesses and fake paperwork fuelled by jealous ministers who wanted the King’s allegiance for themselves meant Fouquet spent the rest of his life in Prison, dying 19 years later. From that day no king ever slept at Vaux-le-Vicomte. It took Mrs Fouquet 10 years to get the castle back and she lived there until 1705. After that it was sold and resold several times then left abandoned and in ruins until a sugar baron, Alfred Sommier bought it. He and his descendants the Vogüé family have spent the last 140 years restoring and preserving this magnificent castle.

Fontainebleau – one of the most incredible castles of France

The Chateau de Fontainebleau that Louis XIV went to from Vaux-le-Vicomte is not far away. And it too has an astounding history. 500 years older than Versailles. The original chapel was consecrated by Thomas Becket, AKA Saint Thomas of Canterbury and Thomas à Becket. This incredible place has more than 1500 rooms and is the only royal and imperial chateau in France that has been continuously inhabited for eight centuries. From the 12^th Century, when it was a royal hunting lodge in a vast forest, the building was renovated, extended, and embellished by various Kings, Queens Emperors, and Empresses until it became the extraordinary, enormous castle you can visit and ogle at today.

The castle was a favourite of the royals including Francois 1er, the Renaissance King, Louis XIV and Marie-Antoinette. In one of the rooms is a bed commissioned by her, but she never got to sleep on it, she lost her head before she had the chance. It was also a favourite of Napoleon Bonaparte and there are lots of memories of the General, his hats, clothes and personal belongs, his son’s cradle, toys, and books – you get a sense of Napoleon the man. Sure, he loved bling and power and money, but he loved his son, he was a doting dad. And it’s here that Napoleon said au revoir to his personal guard when he was exiled from France. It’s a magnificent castle full of truly stunning art, carpets, furniture, paintings, tapestries, gorgeous gardens.

Chateau de Guédelon, Burgundy

You may know this castle from a UK TV series which followed its creation and progress. The Chateau de Guédelon is not your average French chateau. A team of about 50 builders, creating a medieval castle from scratch, in a middle of a forest, with the methodology and the tools used in the 13th century. Every craft needed to build a medieval castle is there: stonemasons, carpenters, blacksmiths, tilers, weavers, dyers, rope-makers, and many more, all working to revive the 800-year-old crafts and skills required to build such a castle.

It even has a flour mill that has also been constructed from scratch, with the aim of producing the same type of flour as in the Middle Ages. And that bit is based on the remains of a 12th century water mill found in the Jura region not very far away. They bake bread made from the Guédelon-ground flour and baked in the castle’s oven!

It’s a folie, a crazy but fantastic project. It started in 1997, the idea of local French chateau restorer and owner Michel Guyot. He and his brother Jacques have a passion for historic buildings and for restoring them. The work inspired in them a passion to learn more about building a castle. It should be finished in 2025. You can visit it of course and you can also “apporter votre pierre à l’édifice” which literally translates to “bring your own stone to the building” which means play your part, do your bit to help.

Fun fact: Some of the techniques that have been rediscovered here are being used in the reconstruction of Notre dame in Paris.

Tallest Castle in France

The Chateau de Brissac in the Loire, is a whopping seven-storeys high! It’s 48 metres, 157 feet high and is known as the “giant of the Loire Valley.” It was first built in the 11^th century and updated and extended over the years. Records show the family of the Dukes of Brissac moved in on May 26 . Their descendants still live in this 200-roomed home to this day. They rent out a couple of incredible rooms with four poster beds, tapestries, and antiques galore. The Duke told me that he nips into the nearby town to pick up your croissants for breakfast! It’s also said that Brissac is haunted! A gruesome double murder took place here in the 15^th century. The owner at that time, one Jacques de Brézé caught his wife with her lover. He ran them both through with his sword, pinning their souls forever between the castle walls, it’s said you can hear their sighs on a dark night…

Most haunted castle in France

But Brissac is not the most haunted castle. That accolade goes to the fairy tale pretty Chateau de Puymartin, between the lovely medieval towns of Sarlat and Les Eyzies in Dordogne is said to be France’s most haunted chateau. People sometimes claim to see “La Dame Blanche” (“The White Lady”) running towards the chateau’s North Tower, the spirit of the owner’s wife Thérèse de Saint-Clar, who died after 15 years of being locked in a tiny room in the chateau’s tower in the 16th-century. The story goes that her husband locked her up after he found out she had a lover. She paces the tower at night…

The Oldest castle in France

The oldest castle in France is the Château de Thil in Burgundy. Building was started in the year 850, almost 1300 years ago! It’s actually a bit of a ruin, but you can still see its beautiful shape, a majestic ruin. You can visit for free – it’s in the town of Vic-Sous-Thil, not far from Beaune, Dijon or Vezelay. France is full of ancient castles, like Montbazon, in the Loire Valley. It was built between 991 and 996 A. D., and its keep, a fortified tower is 92 feet high. It was commissioned by Foulque Nerra, Count of Anjou, a region in the Loire Valley. He was famous for his many castles and his bad temper. He was part of the family line of the English house of Windsor as well as the French monarchs.

And another old castle, not too far away in the Loire Valley is Le Chateau d’Angers in the town of the same name. Its outer walls are 10 feet thick, and it was considered impregnable in its day. It has unusual “stripes” of limestone and a darker stone called schist, and 17 towers. Inside, you can see the oldest medieval tapestry in the world, La Tenture de l’Apocalypse, from the 14th century, depicting the Biblical book of Revelation.

There are also some fabulous tapestries at the nearby Hôpital Saint-Jean, itself a masterpiece of Plantagenet Gothic architecture. These tapestries are more modern, by an artist called Jean artist Jean Lurçat (born 1892) called Le Chant du Monde – a poetic and symbolic vision of the world in which the artist defines Man’s place within the universe. They are extraordinary.

The largest castle in France

One of the largest chateaux in France is Chambord in the Loire Valley. Teeming with turrets and towers, gleaming white stone contrasts with its pointy black slate roof, it is a magnificent display of power and good taste. Built by Francois 1er, known as the Renaissance King, as he built castles in the French Renaissance style and invited Leonardo da Vinci to come and stay in his castle Clos Luce in the Loire. Leonardo said yes, left Italy on a donkey carrying his belongings including the Mona Lisa painting which Francois put in his bathroom, and lived the rest of his life in France.

Francois built Chambord as a symbol of his power, 426 rooms, 282 fireplaces and 83 staircases including a double helix spiral staircase said to be designed by Leonardo. It is so big, and it was so expensive to build with its ornate ceilings and walls that it was never finished in Francois lifetime but it’s absolutely glorious – just as he intended.

Perched castles in France

We’re staying in Dordogne for one of the highest castles in France – the lovely chateau de Beynac. Not quite nosebleed high, but if you don’t like heights, don’t hang out over the ramparts at this one! The castle rises hundreds of feet above the Dordogne River. It’s within eyesight of its adversary, Castelnaud which is even higher up and just minutes up the river. Both fortresses were focal points of the Hundred Years War. You’ll see signs to reach the castle by climbing a twisting, cobblestone path flanked by dreamy stone cottages. What they don’t tell you is that you don’t need to walk up the steep path. There’s a road going up to a parking lot near the castle entrance!

A papal palace in France

There is one palace in France that’s not like the others – it’s the Palais des Papes, the Popes Palace in Avignon. There was a time in the early 1300’s when the seat of the Catholic Church was in Provence, not Rome. And the Popes built themselves a palace – In fact it is the largest Gothic Palace on earth, breathtakingly beautiful with ceremonial halls, chapels, papal apartments, and a kitchen so big you could roast up to 50 oxen at once in there!

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Janine Marsh is the author of several internationally best-selling books about France. Her latest book How to be French – a celebration of the French lifestyle and art de vivre, is out now – a look at the French way of life. Find all books on her website janinemarsh.com