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Château Gardens
In many cases the most striking feature of the châteaux along the Loire and its tributaries are their gardens. While we were not touched by the stiffly formal gardens built by Diane and Catherine at Chenonceau -- perhaps rivalry doesn't make for good gardens -- the gardens at Azay, Villandry, and Chaumont surprised and delighted us. | ||
 Azay-le-Rideau |
After Amboise, a castle (with a small garden) in the middle of a town, our next Loire châteaux was Azay-le-Rideau, a castle set like a gem in the middle of a garden built by another wealthy courtier, a knight named Rideau. The town of Azay is famous for an unfortunate event in 1418. The young Dauphin, Charles VII, a young man of, being charitable, remarkable ugliness, passed by the castle and, unrecognized by the Burgundian guard within, was heckled for his looks. Taking extreme umbrage, Charles sent troops to burn the village and kill the captain and his 350 guards. For the next two hundred years the town was known as Azay-le-Brûlé but was renamed for the original owner when it was rebuilt by yet another wealthy friend of the court, a financier, in 1518. Like Chenonceau, the wife was the prime mover in the reconstruction, and the result is human but still stiff. |
On a whirlwind tour of four châteaux in one day, with Azay the first, I was so taken with the garden I didn't take any pictures ... sorry. One memorable feature: a reflecting pool carefully placed to show the building off to its best effect down several viewing corridors through the garden. I was just beginning to understand the way the gardens were used to perfect the estate. |
 servant's stair at Azay |
 Villandry: the allegories of Love |
I couldn't miss this at Villandry, a squarish, squat châteaux (among the last built along the Loire) undistinguished but for its brilliant gardens. The original formal renaissance gardens were recreated from etchings and records starting in 1906 by a physician, Joachim Carvallo, in his capacity as the first head of the French Historic Houses Association. They are a treasure. More than fifteen acres of meticulously managed garden struck me at first as another remarkably geometric presentation of boxwood shapes, this time representing the "allegories of love" (true love, jealous love, etc.), music, and crosses. The upper terrace doubles as a reflecting pool and a reservoir for gravity feed irrigation. |
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Very nice, thought I. But would you look at those sculpted trees and sharp-edged hedges? I must learn to grow boxwood like this, as soon as possible! Approaching the lower garden I was stopped in my tracks to find between the hedges great riotous stripes of broad-leafed chard, purple basil, leeks, peas, squash ... Edibles! The human food equivalent of a reflecting pool serving as a reservoir. Honey, if times get really rough, we can always eat the garden...
zig-zag boxwood, stripes of veggies
A squad of happy little pear trees were in full production, presenting perhaps two-dozen pears each, standing sentry at the corners of the compounds of oregano, lettuce, sorrel, and peppers, all chosen and sown not for food but for their color and texture in the garden when seen from above as we walk along the promenade of grapes. How tasty! |
 the châteaux across the second terrace
A sign informs us that it takes thirteen full-time gardeners and careful crop rotation to keep the garden presentable through the tourist season. Looking at all the "at peak" vegetables, I wondered, where were those gardeners working today? And how do they keep the chard so pest free? At no time did I see evidence of biocides, but the absence of all but a few beneficial insects (and no birds or bees) made me wonder, too.
full-length grape promenade |
 mosaiculture exhibition at Chaumont |
At Chaumont, a different approach to impressive gardening was hatched in 1993. Annually thirty landscape gardeners from all over the world are invited to make small (250 m2) gardens spending no more than 80,000 Francs (about $11,000). Hmmm. A one-year garden costing $110 a square foot? Well, on a hot, lazy Saturday in August, I'll go look... |
This year's theme: mosaiculture, the art of using tight plantings to create smaller versions of Villandry-style "pictures". The entries were varied, surprising, but not all successful. One fascinating one (that didn't photograph well) a tunnel made of gauze housed a collecting of petrie-dishes with colorful cultures. |
 mosaiculture painting and its subject |
 "props" like mirrors and cloth |
Many of the less successful gardens relied on props to make a more impressive effect, but they were more self-conscious than those that let the plants tell the whole story. |
Several gardens went "outside the element" by supporting the plants hydroponically or in metal baskets of growing medium -- NOT dirt -- and shaping them into ribbons, surfaces, and enclosures. In this garden, a raised metal pathway led through a growing arch around a tower of babel. |
 three-dimensional mosaiculture |
 A water mosaic with goldfish |
 Histogram |
 water garden pine forest held over |
My favorite was a hold-over from last year, a garden in which the plan had been made with the site in mind, and used native pines and a clever wrought iron water-railing to create a glade of peace and coolness on a too-hot hillside. Within the glade a spirit of calm and silence prevailed even over the most obstreperous children and unaware adults. Garden magic! |
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