The locks with their intense activity will be of great interest to children. This is a very popular place for walking because you can explore the banks of the Seine overlooking Croissy. You will be able to admire the Château de poche and then hunt for antiques at “Emmaüs”, which is opposite the locks beyond […]
At the beginning of the 20th century, Bougival was a major centre for cleaning and washing laundry. An abundant water supply, aristocratic customers and the closeness of Paris led to the growth of a laundering business, documented as far back as the 18th century, which led to a particular type of architecture. When the weather […]
Ivan Turgenev’s datcha A former estate of La Chaussée, which had belonged to the de Mesmes family, from whom the Empress Joséphine had bought it in 1813. The Palladian-style house was built in 1830. In 1874, the property was bought by Ivan Turgenev who later sold it to the opera singer Pauline Viardot, Maria Malibran’s […]
This property, one of the oldest in Bougival, dates back to 1830. The property of Les Fresnes was part of the La Jonchère estate at the beginning of the 19th century when Eugène de Beauharnais lived there. It was then that this house must have been built in the neo-classical taste of the period, reminiscent […]
Bougival is embellished with a number of public fountains, which differ depending on their location. This particular one, surmounted by a carved bracket and lodged in a retaining wall when the church and its surroundings were being rebuilt, shows the importance of springs in the town and it collected water as it resurfaced after flowing […]
Berthe Morisot lived and worked in Bougival, at 4 rue de la Princesse (1 avenue de la Drionne) where she rented this house and she spent every summer in it between 1881 and 1884. During 1982, she spent most of the year at the house with her husband Eugène Manet and her daughter Julie. The […]
The prestigious history of Bougival’s great organ began when it was built in the workshops of the famous firm of Cavaillé-Coll, which was then in the hands of his successor Charles Mutin. It was here also that the magnificent organs of the Basilica of St Denis, Perpignan Cathedral and even Notre-Dame were built. The great […]
The Pavillon de Blois is all that remains of a property acquired by Mademoiselle de Blois, the legitimate daughter of Louis XIV and Mademoiselle de la Vallière, in September 1711. She stayed there until 1716. The small house by the name of de Blois which remains in the garden was one of the outbuildings of […]
The building of the present Town Hall is a beautifully designed town house, which was built in 1863 for Madame Alexandre. In 1963, the former town hall was becoming too cramped owing to the increase in the number of inhabitants so the Municipal Council bought Madame Alexandre’s property and converted it into a Town Hall. 126 rue […]
This statue represents a wounded eagle, lifting a wing riddled with grapeshot, holding a broken flagpole in one claw on which the names of Austerlitz, Iéna (Jena), Friedland and Eckmühl can be read. […] With its beak open, the eagle seems to be crying out in despair and anger. One of its wings is beating […]
Situated at the bottom of the hill, beside the Seine, this house in Directoire style with a pediment on its four sides, decorated with arched windows on the ground floor and busts on the façade, was built at the beginning of the 18th century. The elegant simplicity of its style and its position in the […]
A monument erected in memory of François Debergue, a gardener from Bougival, who was shot by the Prussians on 6 September 1870 for having cut the telegraph lines connecting their headquarters to Versailles on three occasions.
In 1770, this Empire style building, which then only had a ground floor and a first floor, was sold under a lease by Joseph, Marquis de Mesmes, Lord of Bougival and of La Chaussée, Marshall of the King’s camps and armies, to Jean-Jacques Garnier (1729-1805), an inspector at the Collège Royal of France where he […]
The locks of La Loge Island The purpose of building a second “Marly Machine”, undertaken under Charles X and later under Napoléon III, was to restore river traffic, by building a lock. Situated between the Island of La Loge and Gautier Island, Bougival’s old lock is 113 m long and 12 m wide (on the Gautier […]
Georges Régnault was a painter who lived in Bougival from 1941 to 1979. He settled with his wife Louisette in a small house by the Seine situated at 11 rue Ivan Tourgueniev, which had belonged to Louise Abéma, a portraitist of Sarah Bernhardt and a famous painter in 1890.
This monument, in the shape of a column, was erected in 1818 by the writer and politician Boissy d’Anglas, in honour of his friends, the Montgolfier brothers. It is all that remains of a magnificent property of 27 hectares (about 67 acres) called “Le Val d’Anglas” (the valley of Anglas), owned by the former Deputy of […]
Emile RICHEBOURG (1833-1898), a famous writer and serial writer, lived at 7 route de La Celle St Cloud in a property to which he had given the name “La Charmeuse”, because it was the success of his novel “Andréa la Charmeuse” which had enabled him, in 1880, to purchase this property.
The Countess Thal de Lançay, who operated some quarries known as “Le Blanc Du Barry à Bougival” owned the château of the Du Barry. At this time, the land went back as far as the château. The grand entrance flanked by 2 lions was built from stone and wrought iron in 1862 and 1884 by […]
The name of this house derives from a contraction of “mauvais port” (bad port) or “port maudit (cursed port). It was indeed in this place that the Normans landed in 856 to massacre the surrounding inhabitants, before being stopped by Charles the Bald’s army. This very ornate house, characteristic of the pastiches created under Napoléon […]
The Marly Machine, which is in fact situated in Bougival, was the first link in a range of machinery for bringing water from the Seine to Versailles to deliver water to the many ornamental lakes and fountains in the gardens of the château.Water was transported 163 metres above the level of the Seine by a […]
Le Coq Hardi was for a long time, since around 1880, a restaurant famed for its food and galleries of cellars dug into the hillside. A place frequented by celebrities attracted by both its refined cuisine and its many welcoming terraces and lovely flower-filled gardens. It has since been taken over by “Le CoQ de Bougival” […]
The town of Bougival’s location on a hillside led to several wash-houses being built close to the springs. The picturesque wash-house in the hamlet of St-Michel, a place of local heritage, was already mentioned on a plan dated 1858. It is built of stone, tiles and wood and was restored in the 21st century (June […]
The Pavillon de Blois is a miniature house built in the grounds of the property of Mademoiselle de Blois, the legitimate daughter of Louis XIV and Mademoiselle de la Vallière. She stayed in Bougival from 1711 to 1716. Today all that remains is this little pavilion in the garden of a private residence. The building looks […]