Magnanville Castle dans les Yvelines

Timeline

Key figures

Origin and history

Magnanville Castle, located in the present Yvelines department in Île-de-France, was initially a modest medieval mansion mentioned in the 11th century. The lords of Magnanville, then the families of Landes and Briçonnet, owned it until the early 18th century, when the estate was acquired by the farmer general Charles Savalette in 1720. The latter considerably expanded the fief by buying neighbouring land for a total of £7 million, laying the foundations for an exceptional estate.

Between 1750 and 1753 Charles Savalette had the castle rebuilt by architect François II Franque, for a cost of 2.4 million pounds. The new building, of remarkable magnificence, impressed the contemporaries with its fascist and French-style gardens. Savalette held a lavish reception there, but excessive expenses forced his son, Charles-Pierre, to sell the estate in 1767 to Philippe-Guillaume Tavernier de Boullongne, a farmer general and patron.

Under Tavernier de Boullongne, Magnanville became a worldly meeting place, welcoming even Emperor Joseph II in 1777. The owner had a comedy hall set up and transformed the gardens into an English park. However, in debt, he was already planning to sell the estate in his will of 1783. After his death, the castle was acquired in 1791 by Viscount Morel de Vindé, who led a more sober life there before having it demolished in 1803, desperate by the death of his daughter.

In 1807, Baron Jacques-Florent Robillard, regent of the Banque de France, bought some of the ruins and had the wing still visible today rebuilt. The estate then passed into the hands of his family, then of the painter Georges Clairin in 1878, before being acquired in 1898 by Count Alfred de Gramont. In 1928, his widow sold him to the Association Léopold Bellan, which installed a sanatorium there, now transformed into a centre of gerontology.

The original castle, described by Dezallier d-Argenville, featured rectangular stone-cut architecture with 19-span facades and ionic columns. Its interior consisted of 4 large apartments on the ground floor and 22 on the first floor, richly decorated by artists such as Oudry, Boucher and Challe. A comedy hall, created by architect Jean-Jacques Huvé, and a chapel in doric order completed this sumptuous ensemble, symbol of the nascent Louis XVI style.

Destroyed at the beginning of the 19th century, the castle of Magnanville was left with descriptions and archives. Its wing, rebuilt in 1807, is much more modest, but bears witness to its prestigious past. The estate, once spread over 200 acres, still dominates the Seine valley between Mantes-la-Jolie and Rosny-sur-Seine, recalling the age of the great aristocratic residences of the Ancien Régime.

External links