Photo : User:Denys / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 2.5)
Château de Boursault
The château de Boursault overlooks the Marne valley, near Épernay. It was built between 1842 and 1848 by the architect Jean-Jacques Nicolas Arveuf-Fransquin for the de Chevigné family, heir to the Veuve Clicquot; the first stone was laid on 15 August 1842. This neo-Renaissance residence, often compared to Chambord, is a pastiche of sixteenth-century châteaux. It keeps a main building and a tower of the old castle.
Inside, the panelling of the great drawing room and dining room is by Jean-Baptiste-Jules Klagmann, and the boudoir ceiling was painted by Levastre.
The estate passed in 1866 to the Duchess of Uzès, born Anne de Rochechouart-Mortemart, who sold it in 1913. The château served as a military hospital during both world wars.
Today at the centre of a wine estate, it gives its name to a champagne made on site since 1927. Its eleven-hectare park is on the pre-inventory of remarkable gardens.
