The Gardens of Le Château de Fontainebleau
Style Observer Gardening continues its July spotlight on a few of Paris’s most celebrated gardens. Today we enjoy the sumptuous gardens of Le Château de Fontainebleau. We start at the Grand Parterre that covers 11 hectares and is the largest formal garden in Europe.We then continue on to the landscaped English Garden planted with rare species and scattered with statues, the Garden of Diana where the Fountain of Diana housed at the centre of the garden is topped by a statue of the goddess, and the Carp Lake, formerly a marsh, transformed into a decorative water feature by Francis I.
No better way, we reckon, to discover the botanical and architectural heritage of this ‘true abode’ of the kings of France.
Credit: Fontainebleau Tourisme and Château de Fontainebleau
