Marie-Antoinette’s Estate

Marie-Antoinette’s Estate is composed of the Petit Trianon, the formal garden, the queen’s theatre, the landscape garden, small monuments of the country garden and the queen’s Hamlet.
You will do the guided visit of the Petit Trianon and then you will have free access to the rest of the Estate.
Under the influence of Madame of Pompadour, Louis XV decided to create a new domain where he could manage to combine his desire for privacy, far from the Versailles Etiquette, with his taste for botany, agriculture and natural sciences.

The construction, entrusted to Ange-Jacques Gabriel, lasted 6 years, from 1762 to 1768. Madame of Pompadour died on the 15 April 1764 and never saw it finished. So, it was with his new mistress, Madame du Barry, that Louis XV inaugurated the Petit Trianon Palace.

This chateau was built in neoclassical style also called “Greek style” architecture, which was then in vogue with its squared plan and simple, refined volume. Sobriety, order and symmetry.
 Louis XV died in 1774 and the Countess du Barry had to leave the Trianon. One month after his grandfather’s death, the new king, Louis XVI offered the chateau to his wife Marie-Antoinette with the famous sentence : “You love flowers, Madame, I have a bunch to offer to you. It’s the Trianon”. Marie-Antoinette made it her favourite place to stay. She undertook a lot of constructions in the Palace and on the Estate.
During the French Revolution, the furniture was sold by auction.

Under the Empire, the Petit Trianon was refurbished and restored for Pauline Borghèse, Napoleon I’s sister, then for the empress Marie-Louise.
Under the 'July' Monarchy, Louis-Philippe left the Trianon to his son, the Duke of   Orleans and his wife.
In 1867, the empress Eugenie made it into a Museum in memory of Marie-Antoinette.
The last restoration (2007-2008) restored its rightful nobility to the Trianon where the Queen seems to reside…