Heritage Days 2024: an unusual and free visit to the Désert de Retz in Chambourcy (78)

How about discovering the Désert de Retz during the Heritage Days? This Sunday, September 22, 2024, the site invites you to join us. It's time to immerse yourself in the world of this unusual area, with an attractive free program.

The Désert de Retz at Chambourcy is a walk through history. Located in Chambourcy, the site welcomes us for an immersion in an 18th-century park of fabriques, a reflection of the Enlightenment. Designed between 1774 and 1789 by François Racine de Monville, the park was created at a time when architectural beauty and nature merged to create a space for reverie. Unfortunately, the French Revolution left its mark, plunging the Désert de Retz into oblivion.

Thanks to the Chambourcy town council, a wind of rebirth blew in 2009, after two centuries of disuse. Here, we discover fabriques inspired by Chinese, Oriental and antique styles, punctuating our tour.

Iconic figures such as Marie-Antoinette, the Countess du Barry, Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson have walked these grounds. You'll discover the destroyed 25-metre column, the ruined Gothic church, the temple of the god Pan, the Ice Pyramid, the Tartar tent and the obelisk. A discovery that, we assure you, will not leave you indifferent.

• To be read
• Tips for the week of September 9 - 15, 2024 in Paris: free or inexpensive outings
• What to do in Paris and the Paris Region in September 2024? Back-to-school ideas

The 2024 Heritage Days program at Désert de Retz :

• Musical parade to celebrate 250 years of Désert de Retz
  Saturday, September 21, 2:00 pm, 4:00 pm
  

  To mark the 250th anniversary of the creation of the Désert de Retz, come and discover a musical stroll around seven emblematic buildings: the Temple to the god Pan, the Discovered Theatre, the almost ruined Little Altar, the Ice Pyramid, the Gothic Church, the Tartar Tent and the Destroyed Column. Created and presented by Espace Vocal and its founder Carole Chabry, First Prize in Singing at the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique et de Danse de Paris.

  
  
  
• Time travel at Désert de Retz
  Sunday, September 22, 10:00 a.m.
  

  For the European Heritage Days, the Désert de Retz opens its doors for a trip back in time! On the program: ancient wood games, kite workshop, equestrian shows, discovery of the Désert de Retz orchard and beehives, play Les Deux Gentilshommes de Vérone...
  In partnership with the association "Le Désert de Retz, Jardin des Lumières".

  
  
  
• The Two Gentlemen of Verona" play
  Sunday, September 22, 3:00 pm
  

  Come and discover the play "The Two Gentlemen of Verona" by William Shakespeare, directed by Maud Buquet Kandinsky!
  
  Can love betray love?... Protée and Valentin, two inseparable friends, fall in love with the same woman, Sylvia, daughter of the Duke of Milan. Will their friendship survive? An initiatory tale, a twirling comedy served up by fifteen actors and musicians from the troupe La Pépinière du Nouveau Monde.

  
  
  

Here's a good plan to discover for these Journées du Patrimoine 2024 in the Yvelines. We're sure you won't be disappointed by this wonderful escape to an extraordinary place.