Versailles is the epicenter of excess in the outskirts of Paris. Originally a country residence removed from Paris, it is now subsumed into the suburban sprawl of the capital city. Versailles was built in the 17th century as a lavish display of luxury and expression of power, with 2,300 rooms and space for 20,000 people. Guesses about the relative cost of building Versailles range from $2 to $300 billion dollars. Louis XIV — the Sun King — set up his court and government there in 1682 at the site of Louis XIII’s hunting lodge. The palace remained the seat of the French government for about a century until the French Revolution in 1789. It has been a museum since 1837.
Versailles is still a place of excess. Each year, about 15 million visitors flock to ogle the opulent furnishings, art, and architecture of the castle. It is completely overrun with tourists who wait hours in a long, snaking line to get in, only to push through the tour path, shoulder-to-shoulder with other visitors. I witnessed multiple people suffering panic attacks due to the claustrophobic conditions inside. I was there in a working capacity with a student group, and I’ll never go back.
There are so many fountains in the vast French gardens that it never has been possible to have them all filled with water and running at any one time. The gardens feel never-ending, especially when wandering in the summer heat. I found some respite at the Petit Trianon. A trianon is a small palace built on the grounds of a larger one. The Petit Trianon is actually within the park of the Grand Trianon, another castle on the grounds of Versailles.
The Petit Trianon was built by Louis XV in the 1760s for his head mistress, Madame de Pompadour. She died of tuberculosis before it was finished, so the king’s next mistress lived there instead. In this era, the king’s maîtresse-en-titre was an officially recognized position, given responsibilities and benefits.
When Louis XV died and Louis XVI took the throne, he gifted Petit Trianon to his young wife, Marie Antoinette. She quickly set about renovating it and used it as a place of retreat, her private “cottage” to get away from the court and relax.
One major change Marie Antoinette made was to redesign the formal French garden, emphasizing geometry, symmetry, and control over nature, to an English garden. The English garden is more naturalistic, featuring meandering paths, asymmetry, and places to contemplate. In 1777, Marie Antoinette commissioned the Temple de l’Amour to be built on a small island on a river. This Temple of Love is a folly, or an ornamental garden structure built for no real reason.
This folly, a monument to love built on the grounds of a castle on the grounds of a bigger castle on the grounds of an even bigger castle, epitomizes the excess that is Versailles.
