The Château de Montgobert in the midst of the

Forest of Retz The Forest of Retz (French ''Forêt de Retz'', ) is one of the largest forests of France, covering some 13,000 hectares in the Aisne about 80 km northeast of Paris. It is a national forest (''forêt domaniale'') in the former Picardy regio ...

, near

Soissons Soissons () is a commune in the northern French department of Aisne, in the region of Hauts-de-France. Located on the river Aisne, about northeast of Paris, it is one of the most ancient towns of France, and is probably the ancient capital ...

, in Montgobert,

Aisne Aisne ( , ; ; pcd, Ainne) is a French department in the Hauts-de-France region of northern France. It is named after the river Aisne. In 2019, it had a population of 531,345.Picardy Picardy (; Picard and french: Picardie, , ) is a historical territory and a former administrative region of France. Since 1 January 2016, it has been part of the new region of Hauts-de-France. It is located in the northern part of France. Hi ...

, is a neoclassical French

château A château (; plural: châteaux) is a manor house or residence of the lord of the manor, or a fine country house of nobility or gentry, with or without fortifications, originally, and still most frequently, in French-speaking regions. Nowaday ...

that was built for Antoine Pierre Desplasses between 1768 and 1775 on the site of an ancient seigneurie. The château, which has the air of an English

Palladian Palladian architecture is a European architectural style derived from the work of the Venetian architect Andrea Palladio (1508–1580). What is today recognised as Palladian architecture evolved from his concepts of symmetry, perspective and ...

house, with four Ionic columns under an arced pediment, raised upon a high rusticated basement, was owned by

Pauline Bonaparte Paula Maria Bonaparte Leclerc Borghese ( French: ''Pauline Marie Bonaparte''; 20 October 1780 – 9 June 1825), better known as Pauline Bonaparte, was an imperial French princess, the first sovereign Duchess of Guastalla, and the princess cons ...

, Napoleon's sister and wife of General

Charles Leclerc Charles Marc Hervé Perceval Leclerc (; born 16 October 1997) is a Monégasque racing driver, currently racing in Formula One for Scuderia Ferrari. He won the GP3 Series championship in 2016 and the FIA Formula 2 Championship in . Leclerc ma ...

who employed

Pierre-François-Léonard Fontaine Pierre-François-Léonard Fontaine (; 20 September 1762 – 10 October 1853) was a neoclassical French architect, interior decorator and designer. Life and work Starting in 1794 Fontaine worked in such close partnership with Charles Percier, ...

to raise the house by adding an attic storey about 1798 and transformed the

parterre A ''parterre'' is a part of a formal garden constructed on a level substrate, consisting of symmetrical patterns, made up by plant beds, low hedges or coloured gravels, which are separated and connected by paths. Typically it was the part of ...

into a terrace overlooking the park, which was re-landscaped in the naturalistic fashion, ''à l'anglaise'', with meadows and clumps of trees and specimens against a background of woodland. He died in

Saint Domingue Saint-Domingue () was a French colonization of the Americas, French colony in the western portion of the Caribbean island of Hispaniola, in the area of modern-day Haiti, from 1659 to 1804. The name derives from the Spanish main city in the islan ...

, present-day

Haiti Haiti (; ht, Ayiti ; French: ), officially the Republic of Haiti (); ) and formerly known as Hayti, is a country located on the island of Hispaniola in the Greater Antilles archipelago of the Caribbean Sea, east of Cuba and Jamaica, and ...

in November 1802; his ashes were returned to Montgobert and a tomb in the park was designed by Fontaine and executed by a certain Laudier,Apparently a local stonemason. but never finished. The outbuildings were constructed before 1831, when they appear on an estate map. The pair of entrance pavilions date after 1835. In the early twentieth century the office of

Achille Duchêne Achille Duchêne (1866 — 1947) was a French garden designer who worked in the grand manner established by André Le Nôtre. The son of the landscaper Henri Duchêne, Achille Duchêne was the garden designer most in demand among high French societ ...

reorganized the grand terrace: a semi-circular

was flanked by terraces connected by stairs. The château passed by inheritance to maréchal Davout, then to the Cambacérès and Suchet d'Albuféra families. Today the chateau belongs to the Cambacérès and Suchet d'Albuféra families. Since 1974 it has housed a collection of wooden ware ("treen") and some 3000 different tools.

Notes

External links

The gardens and parkchateaudemontgobert.com
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Notes

External links

Further reading