Château de Ferrières
Encyclopedia
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
château
Château
A château is a manor house or residence of the lord of the manor or a country house of nobility or gentry, with or without fortifications, originally—and still most frequently—in French-speaking regions...
built between 1855 and 1859 by Baron James de Rothschild
James Mayer de Rothschild
James Mayer de Rothschild was a French banker and the original founder of the French branch of the Rothschild family.-Biography:...
in the Goût Rothschild
Goût Rothschild
Le Goût Rothschild, , describes a style of glamorous interior decoration and living which has its origin in France, Britain and Germany in the 19th century. It was the time when the fame, wealth and power of the Rothschild Dynasty was at its height...
. Rothschild ownership of the Château de Ferrières was passed down through the male line according to the rule of primogeniture
Primogeniture
Primogeniture is the right, by law or custom, of the firstborn to inherit the entire estate, to the exclusion of younger siblings . Historically, the term implied male primogeniture, to the exclusion of females...
. Considered by far the largest and most luxurious 19th century château in France, it is reached from rue Rucherie in Ferrières-en-Brie
Ferrières-en-Brie
Ferrières-en-Brie is a commune in the Seine-et-Marne department in the Île-de-France region in north-central France.-Geography:Ferrières-en-Brie is located east of Paris, on the Brie plateau, between the Seine river and Marne river valleys.-Castle:...
in the Seine et Marne département of France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
about 26 km east of Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
.
Sitting at the crest of a long entry drive, the château was designed by the British
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
architect Joseph Paxton
Joseph Paxton
Sir Joseph Paxton was an English gardener and architect, best known for designing The Crystal Palace.-Early life:...
. The inspiration for the design of Ferrières was Mentmore Towers
Mentmore Towers
Mentmore Towers is a 19th century English country house in the village of Mentmore in Buckinghamshire. The house was designed by Joseph Paxton and his son-in-law, George Henry Stokes, in the revival Elizabethan and Jacobean style of the late 16th century called Jacobethan, for the banker and...
in Buckinghamshire
Buckinghamshire
Buckinghamshire is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan home county in South East England. The county town is Aylesbury, the largest town in the ceremonial county is Milton Keynes and largest town in the non-metropolitan county is High Wycombe....
, England, the house Paxton built for Baron James's cousin Mayer Amschel de Rothschild
Mayer Amschel de Rothschild
Mayer Amschel de Rothschild of the English branch of the Rothschild family was the fourth and youngest son of Nathan Mayer Rothschild . He was named Mayer Amschel Rothschild, for his grandfather, the patriarch of the Rothschild family.-Life:Known to his family as "Muffy", he was born in New Court,...
. On seeing Mentmore, Baron James is reputed to have summoned Paxton and ordered "Build me a Mentmore, but twice the size"
Built in the Neo-Renaissance
Neo-Renaissance
Renaissance Revival is an all-encompassing designation that covers many 19th century architectural revival styles which were neither Grecian nor Gothic but which instead drew inspiration from a wide range of classicizing Italian modes...
style inspired by architecture of the Italian Renaissance, with square towers at each corner, the house sits on a formal terrace that gives way to 1.25 km² of gardens in a parkland landscaped à l'anglaise that was part of a surrounding 30 km² forest contained in the estate. The showpiece central hall is 120 feet (37 m) long and 60 feet (18 m) high, its roof a full glass skylight. The sculpting of the interior atlas columns and caryatids was by Charles Henri Joseph Cordier
Charles Henri Joseph Cordier
Charles Henri Joseph Cordier , was a French sculptor of Ethnographic subjects.- Career :In 1847, Charles Cordier's meeting with Seïd Enkess, a former black slave who had become a model, determined the course of his career.His first success was a bust in plaster of a Sudanese man "Saïd Abdullah of...
and the decorative painting supervised by Eugène Lami
Eugène Lami
Eugène Louis Lami was a French painter and lithographer. He worked at the studio of Horace Vernet then studied at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris with Camille Roqueplan and Paul Delaroche under Antoine-Jean Gros...
. The massive library held more than 8,000 volumes. Because lavish entertaining was important, in addition to the private Rothschild apartments, the Château de Ferrières was built with eighty guest suites. Ferrières was inaugurated 16 December 1862 with a gala attended by Napoleon III.
Baron James acquired a vast collection of works of art, and statues adorned a number of the château's rooms. Several of the many sculptures were by Alexandre Falguière
Alexandre Falguière
Jean Alexandre Joseph Falguière was a French sculptor and painter.He was born in Toulouse...
and the 18th century Italian, Antonio Corradini
Antonio Corradini
Antonio Corradini was a Venetian Rococo sculptor.Corradini was born in Este and worked mainly in the Veneto, but also completed commissions for work outside Venice, including Naples....
and the Baron's son later added works by René de Saint-Marceaux
René de Saint-Marceaux
Charles René de Paul de Saint-Marceaux was a French sculptor. He was born in Reims and at age eighteen went to Paris to study at the École des Beaux-Arts. A student of François Jouffroy, he became primarily a sculptor of portrait busts and animals...
.
During the Franco-Prussian War
Franco-Prussian War
The Franco-Prussian War or Franco-German War, often referred to in France as the 1870 War was a conflict between the Second French Empire and the Kingdom of Prussia. Prussia was aided by the North German Confederation, of which it was a member, and the South German states of Baden, Württemberg and...
of 1870-71, the Château de Ferrières was seized by the Germans
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
and was the site of negotiations between Otto von Bismarck
Otto von Bismarck
Otto Eduard Leopold, Prince of Bismarck, Duke of Lauenburg , simply known as Otto von Bismarck, was a Prussian-German statesman whose actions unified Germany, made it a major player in world affairs, and created a balance of power that kept Europe at peace after 1871.As Minister President of...
, Chancellor of the North German Confederation
North German Confederation
The North German Confederation 1866–71, was a federation of 22 independent states of northern Germany. It was formed by a constitution accepted by the member states in 1867 and controlled military and foreign policy. It included the new Reichstag, a parliament elected by universal manhood...
, and the French Minister of Foreign Affairs
Minister of Foreign Affairs (France)
Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs ), is France's foreign affairs ministry, with the headquarters located on the Quai d'Orsay in Paris close to the National Assembly of France. The Minister of Foreign and European Affairs in the government of France is the cabinet minister responsible for...
, Jules Favre
Jules Favre
Jules Claude Gabriel Favre was a French statesman. After the establishment of the Third Republic in September 1870, he became one of the leaders of the Opportunist Republicans faction.- Early life :...
. The Germans again seized the château during the occupation of France in World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
and this time, looted its vast art collections. The château remained empty until 1959 when Guy de Rothschild
Guy de Rothschild
Baron Guy Édouard Alphonse Paul de Rothschild was a French banker and member of the Rothschild family. He chaired the bank Rothschild Frères from 1967 to 1979, when it was nationalized by the French government, and maintained possessions in other French and foreign companies including Imerys...
and his new wife, Marie-Hélène de Zuylen van Nyeve
Marie-Hélène de Rothschild
Marie-Hélène de Rothschild was a French socialite who became a doyenne of Parisian high-society and was a member of the prominent Rothschild banking family of France....
set about refurbishing it. Their efforts saw it once again became the place where Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
an nobility
Nobility
Nobility is a social class which possesses more acknowledged privileges or eminence than members of most other classes in a society, membership therein typically being hereditary. The privileges associated with nobility may constitute substantial advantages over or relative to non-nobles, or may be...
mingled with Hollywood movie stars at grand soirées. In 1975, Guy de Rothschild and his wife charitably donated the château to the chancellery of the University of Paris
University of Paris
The University of Paris was a university located in Paris, France and one of the earliest to be established in Europe. It was founded in the mid 12th century, and officially recognized as a university probably between 1160 and 1250...
, and it is now open to the public for guided tours and special events.
Certain scenes in the Roman Polanski
Roman Polanski
Roman Polanski is a French-Polish film director, producer, writer and actor. Having made films in Poland, Britain, France and the USA, he is considered one of the few "truly international filmmakers."...
film The Ninth Gate
The Ninth Gate
The Ninth Gate is a 1999 horror film directed, produced, and co-written by Roman Polanski. It is a neo-noir, occult mystery thriller involving the rare book business, wherein rare-book dealer Dean Corso is hired by bibliophile Boris Balkan to validate a seventeenth-century copy of The Nine Gates...
(2000) were filmed at the Château de Ferrières.