A must-see
article | Reading time5 min
Imagine that when Georges Clemenceau arrived, the house was surrounded by nothing but dunes and sand. Grab your cameras and immortalize the garden's blossoming through the seasons!
Silence ça pousse !
Between 1920 and 1929, Georges Clemenceau's tenacity enabled him to design and create a garden in several parts: a flowered terrace in front of the house, a bed of golden charcoal and another of roses at the back of the house.
By the time Georges Clemenceau arrived at Bélébat in 1919, a transition had taken place in the form of gardens as conceived in the 19th century.
The landscape garden, which had arrived from England, idealized nature and staged the landscape. Its layout is irregular , and its principles are to provide pleasant views of the garden from the building, encouraging visitors to take a stroll.
Gradually, the garden returned to a more regular layout. This became known as the "mixed" garden.
Georges Clemenceau rejected references to the "French-style" garden imposed by the aristocracy and the political and financial bourgeoisie of the time. He disliked allées, massifs and trimmed hedges: "You'll have plenty of time to come and contemplate my garden without flowerbeds, baskets, massifs, groves or alleys".
Nor did he appreciate the new forms proposed at the 1925 Decorative Arts Exhibition: "What kind of design do these gardens have? What were your fathers doing? They couldn't have been priests! I ask you, what are you missing here? An alley! An alley! Like in a bourgeois home! Like at Caillaux's! Why not a lawn, with a ball in the middle, like at Poincaré's?"
© Reproduction Philippe Berthé / Centre des monuments nationaux
A "wild" or "natural" garden
This style, which appeared in 19th century England and was initiated by William Robinson, a horticultural gardener and inventor of the "wild garden", advocates letting nature express itself rather than constraining it, and integrating local or indigenous species into the composition. Indeed, the use of acclimatized hybrid varieties resulting from advances in horticulture is sometimes considered excessive.
Clemenceau liked his compositions to be unordered, with a mix of different species living side by side.
For men, free thought, for plants, free thrust. That's why I don't think I'm authorized to impose my poor human ideas on flowers, which have enough of their own instincts.
On July 12, 1923, he wrote to his friend Claude Monet:
"So here I am, installed in my enchantment of earth, sky and bird. I don't know how they appreciate my presence, but they give me infinite joy. The garden is man: that's what I think about you, that's what I say about myself. Your little puddle here is called the Atlantic... Finally, my garden is a savagery of all the greens on the palette, muddled in the melee of love with rainbow spots that would have fallen in the rain. It can't be described."
© Marie Vernillet - Centre des monuments nationaux
In order to offer visitors a promenade, the garden takes the form of a path such as could be found in gardens of this era, evoking the layout of landscaped gardens.
A main path leads from the reception building to the house, and a ring path leads around the garden. Secondary paths lead to the various areas, including the flower terrace, the parterre de fusains dorés, the petit bois, the enclos and the allée du bord de mer .
In fact, Clemenceau himself went to Angers to find the charcoal!
To the south, between the house and the ocean, the landscape is bathed in light and open to the landscape, while to the north, behind the house, the space is closed in by the proximity of the forest. There are opposites and complementarities in volume and color, and contrasts between open spaces and wooded areas. Here, the well and the bust of Clemenceau face the ocean and the horizon.
The garden is essential to Bélébat: a place for experimentation, meditation and joy. In this highly personal creation, Georges Clemenceau plays with light, space, colors, shapes, textures and plants.
© Centre des monuments nationaux - Sébastien Arnault
