Plan of Château du Val

The Château du Val in Saint-Germain-en-Laye (Yvelines) was originally built for Henri IV as one of his hunting lodges. The construction of the new château began at the order of Louis XIV in 1674 according to the plans by Jules Hardouin-Mansart. The plans for this new building and the state of the château towards the end of the reign of Louis XIV is known from L’Architecture fran�aise published by Jean Mariette in 1727. The château was rebuilt several times in the 18th and 19th centuries.

The Château du Val reveals certain qualities which were not to be typical of Hardouin-Mansart’s mature works, notably ingenuity in planning and inventiveness in the shape of rooms. For instance, the right wing consists of four rooms of different and unusual shapes, grouped so that they can all be heated by a single stove fitted into the space left in the middle of the group. This tendency foreshadows the development of architecture in the first years of the eighteenth century, when Hardouin-Mansart’s pupils were responsible for introducing the more comfortable type of private house.

The picture shows the plan of Château du Val from Jean Mariette’s publication.