The Château de Sceaux () is a grand

country house image:Blenheim - Blenheim Palace - 20210417125239.jpg, 300px, Blenheim Palace - Oxfordshire An English country house is a large house or mansion in the English countryside. Such houses were often owned by individuals who also owned a Townhou ...

Sceaux, Hauts-de-Seine Sceaux () is a Communes of France, commune in the Hauts-de-Seine Departments of France, department in the southern suburbs of Paris, France. It is located from the Kilometre zero, centre of Paris. In 2019, Sceaux had a population of 20,004. Scea ...

, approximately south-southwest of the centre of Paris. Situated in a large park laid out by

André Le Nôtre André Le Nôtre (; 12 March 1613 – 15 September 1700), originally rendered as André Le Nostre, was a French landscape architect and the principal gardener of King Louis XIV of France. He was the landscape architect who designed Gardens ...

, partly in Antony, visitors can tour the house, outbuildings and gardens. The former château was built for

Jean-Baptiste Colbert Jean-Baptiste Colbert (; 29 August 1619 – 6 September 1683) was a French statesman who served as First Minister of State from 1661 until his death in 1683 under the rule of King Louis XIV. His lasting impact on the organization of the countr ...

Louis XIV LouisXIV (Louis-Dieudonné; 5 September 16381 September 1715), also known as Louis the Great () or the Sun King (), was King of France from 1643 until his death in 1715. His verified reign of 72 years and 110 days is the List of longest-reign ...

's minister of finance, who purchased the ''domaine'' in 1670. The present château, designed to evoke the

Louis XIII style The Louis XIII style or ''Louis Treize'' was a fashion in French art and French architecture, architecture, especially affecting the visual arts, visual and decorative arts. Its distinctness as a period in the history of French art has much to do ...

, dates from the Second Empire. Some of Colbert's outbuildings remain, as well as the bones of the garden layout. The Petit Château operates as the Musée de l'Île-de-France, a museum of local history. The commune operates the site as the Musée du Domaine départemental de Sceaux.

History

The seigneurie of Sceaux appears in 15th-century documents, but little remains above ground of the château built for the family Potier de Gesvres in 1597. Colbert turned to some of the premier royal architects and craftsmen to design a seat worthy of his station, the architect brothers Claude and

Charles Perrault Charles Perrault ( , , ; 12 January 162816 May 1703) was a French author and member of the Académie Française. He laid the foundations for a new literary genre, the fairy tale, with his works derived from earlier folk tales, published in his ...

and

Antoine Lepautre Antoine Lepautre () or Le Pautre (1621–1679) was a French architect and engraver. Born in Paris, he was the brother of the prolific and inventive designer-engraver Jean Lepautre. Antoine Lepautre has been called "one of the most inventive archi ...

, and the ''premier peintre du roi''

Charles Le Brun Charles Le Brun (; baptised 24 February 1619 – 12 February 1690) was a French Painting, painter, Physiognomy, physiognomist, Aesthetics, art theorist, and a director of several art schools of his time. He served as a court painter to Louis XIV, ...

Jean-Baptiste Colbert, Marquis de Seignelay Jean-Baptiste Antoine Colbert, Marquis of Seignelay (; 1 November 1651 – 3 November 1690) was a French politician. He was the eldest son of Jean-Baptiste Colbert, nephew of Charles Colbert de Croissy and cousin of Jean-Baptiste Colbert de ...

, son of Colbert and minister of the Navy, inherited Sceaux in 1683. He added sculpture by

François Girardon François Girardon (; 17 March 1628 – 1 September 1715) was a French sculptor of the Louis XIV style or French Baroque, best known for his statues and busts of Louis XIV and for his statuary in the gardens of the Palace of Versailles. Biogra ...

and

Antoine Coysevox Charles Antoine Coysevox ( or ; 29 September 164010 October 1720), was a French sculptor in the Baroque and Louis XIV style, best known for his sculpture decorating the gardens and Palace of Versailles and his portrait busts. Biography Coysev ...

. His embellishments to the grounds extended the formal terraced layout, the bones of which remain, and excavated the Grand Canal, a kilometre in length, along the valley bottom. Le Nôtre laid out a main axis centred on the château and descending in a series of terraces to the valley bottom, then rising on the far side. The main axis is crossed by two grand secondary axes at right angles, one delineated by the Allée de la Duchesse and the formal stone cascade that flows down to fill an octagonal basin, the other the Grand Canal.

Jules Hardouin-Mansart Jules Hardouin-Mansart (; 16 April 1646 – 11 May 1708) was a French Baroque architect and builder whose major work included the Place des Victoires (1684–1690); Place Vendôme (1690); the domed chapel of Les Invalides (1690), and the Gra ...

built the

Orangerie An orangery or orangerie is a room or dedicated building, historically where orange and other fruit trees are protected during the winter, as a large form of greenhouse or conservatory. In the modern day an orangery could refer to either ...

, which was inaugurated by the King at a fête in 1685. Sceaux was sold in 1699 to Louis's illegitimate son,

Louis Auguste, Duke of Maine Louis-Auguste de Bourbon, duc du Maine (31 March 1670 – 14 May 1736) was an illegitimate son of Louis XIV and his maîtresse-en-titre, official mistress, Françoise-Athénaïs de Rochechouart, Marquise de Montespan, Madame de Montespan. The kin ...

, whose wife, Anne, Duchess of Maine made it the setting for her glittering

salon Salon may refer to: Common meanings * Beauty salon A beauty salon or beauty parlor is an establishment that provides Cosmetics, cosmetic treatments for people. Other variations of this type of business include hair salons, spas, day spas, ...

in the first decades of the eighteenth century, which reached its apogee in the ''Grandes Nuits'' of 1714–15, sixteen fêtes of music and opera-ballets that unfolded every two weeks and drew the best musicians of France, under the direction of

Jean-Joseph Mouret Jean-Joseph Mouret (11 April 1682 in Avignon – 10 December 1738 in Charenton-le-Pont) was a French composer whose dramatic works made him one of the leading exponents of Baroque music in his country. Even though most of his works are rarely per ...

. The salon at Sceaux attracted the young

Voltaire François-Marie Arouet (; 21 November 169430 May 1778), known by his ''Pen name, nom de plume'' Voltaire (, ; ), was a French Age of Enlightenment, Enlightenment writer, philosopher (''philosophe''), satirist, and historian. Famous for his wit ...

. The Duchess of Maine had the

pavilion In architecture, ''pavilion'' has several meanings; * It may be a subsidiary building that is either positioned separately or as an attachment to a main building. Often it is associated with pleasure. In palaces and traditional mansions of Asia ...

of the Ménagerie built, to designs by Jacques de La Guépière, and gave it a garden setting, to the north of the château; only its foundations remain.

Demolition

During the French Revolution the property was confiscated as a ''bien national'', its contents sold for the benefit of the nation, and the building bought by M. Lecomte, a merchant of

Saint-Malo Saint-Malo (, , ; Gallo language, Gallo: ; ) is a historic French port in Ille-et-Vilaine, Brittany (administrative region), Brittany. The Fortification, walled city on the English Channel coast had a long history of piracy, earning much wealth ...

. Under the

Consulate A consulate is the office of a consul. A type of mission, it is usually subordinate to the state's main representation in the capital of that foreign country (host state), usually an embassy (or, only between two Commonwealth countries, a ...

, the original château was demolished, but the pavilion of Aurore, the Orangerie, the stables, and outbuildings were preserved. Crops were grown on Le Nôtre's terraces.

The restored castle

The duc de Trévise, son of Napoleon's Maréchal Mortier, who had married the daughter of M. Lecomte, inherited the ''domaine'' and set to restoring the park and the pavilion and Orangerie. The gardens were restored, with parterres and gravel largely replaced by clipped lawns. In 1856-62 he erected the present smaller château in brick with stone quoins, designed to evoke the

, designed by the architect Augustin Théophile Quantinet and built by Joseph-Michel Le Soufaché. In 1922, the heiress of Trévise, princesse de Faucigny-Cystra, planned to give up Sceaux to real estate developers; through the efforts of the mayor Jean-Baptiste Bergeret de Frouville it was preserved and opened to the public of the town that had grown up around the park.

Museum of Île-de-France

Since 2010, the Petit Château houses the Musée de l'Île-de-France. This museum contains one of the largest collections of works by painters of the

School of Paris The School of Paris (, ) refers to the French and émigré artists who worked in Paris in the first half of the 20th century. The School of Paris was not a single art movement or institution, but refers to the importance of Paris as a centre o ...

References

archived website in English

Musée du Domaine départemental de Sceaux
live website in French {{DEFAULTSORT:Château de Sceaux Sceaux Sceaux Châteaux with formal gardens in France Museums in Hauts-de-Seine Art museums and galleries in Île-de-France Decorative arts museums in France Historic house museums in Île-de-France