Oh what a beautiful world Claude Monet
created around his home in the small village of Giverny, just about an hour out
of Paris.
The plantings are casual – drifts of
nasturtiums, bold beds of geraniums, and blocks of other brightly coloured
flowers dance around the garden but the effect is soothing.
It provided inspiration for this famous
painter for more than 20 years and it’s not hard to see why.
I visited the garden with a Trafalgar Insider tour and Travel Director Sarah told us that Monet actually thought he was a better cook than painter. From the size of his dining table, meals must have been a popular event and the large kitchen was well equipped to handle a crowd.
The dining table is long and set with a
white cloth and 14 yellow chairs that often featured in his paintings. A long
row of shiny copper pans hang on the blue tiled kitchen walls but the now the
wood stove is cold. You can’t take photographs in the house but I managed to
capture a glimpse through the kitchen door.
The house was damaged during the World War II and then later the staircase collapsed and floors and ceilings rotted. After 10 years of restoration work, Monet’s house and garden was opened to the public in the 1980s. Visitors can wander through the gardens and the house from April 1 to November 1 each year. When the property is closed the gardens are replanted for the following year’s opening.
There are two sections to the garden - a
flower garden called Clos Normand in front of the house and a Japanese inspired
water garden on the other side of the road. Today the water garden is reached
via
a subway but in Monet’s time he merely strolled across the road.
a subway but in Monet’s time he merely strolled across the road.
The water garden is where you will find the
famous green Japanese bridge draped with wisterias. There are other similar small bridges and
graceful weeping willows all surrounded by a swath of flowers. As I wander the
willow-shaded pathways, my Trafalgar Travel Director, Sarah, reminds me to look
at the reflections, not just the view, as the reflections feature strongly in
Monet’s paintings.
After I’ve had my fill of the garden and
house it’s off down to the historic Giverny village for lunch at the café. It seems to be the only one around but that
certainly hasn’t made them complacent and the food and coffee are good.
There’s a short, self-guided walk through
the village which has a lovely church to view.
Monet’s spirit remains in these flower-filled
gardens, in the studio filled with paintings just as he liked to view them and
in the garden view through the wide open windows visible from his comfortable
bed.
Disclaimer: Kerry Heaney travelled to
Monet’s Garden as a guest of Trafalgar on a Trafalgar Insider tour