The French formal garden

What it is

Nearest the house lie the parterres, flat beds laid out in patterns meant to be seen from the upper windows. The most elaborate, the parterre de broderie, copies the scrolls of embroidery in low clipped box against coloured gravel. Beyond are sheets of water, fountains, statues and long canals. Further out, walls of trimmed trees enclose groves that hide smaller garden rooms. Everything is symmetrical, and distances are adjusted so that the perspective looks perfect from the terrace.

Where it comes from

The style grew from the terraced gardens of Renaissance Italy, which French nobles saw during the wars of the early 1500s. Le Nôtre gave it its full form at Vaux-le-Vicomte, finished in 1661 for the finance minister Nicolas Fouquet. Louis XIV then employed him at Versailles for decades. The style fell from fashion in the later eighteenth century, when the English landscape park took over. Many French gardens were restored in the twentieth century.

The flowers

Flowers had a defined place: in the borders of the parterres and in the private gardens. At the Trianon in Versailles the king kept beds filled with tulips, hyacinths, narcissi, jasmine and tuberose. Plants were grown in pots so the display could be changed quickly, and the scent was said to be overpowering on warm evenings. Orange trees in tubs were wheeled out of the orangery for summer. At Villandry, in the Loire valley, a kitchen garden is laid out as a formal parterre.

How to take part

1. Start on the terrace or at an upper window. The design is made to be read from above.
2. Walk the main axis to the far end, then return through the side groves.
3. At Versailles, go on a day when the fountains are playing, and book ahead.
4. Visit Vaux-le-Vicomte to see the style at a size you can take in within one afternoon.

Good manners

• Do not cross or sit on the box parterres and lawns marked as closed.
• Keep out of the fountain basins.

The flowers

TulipSpring-blooming bulbs with showy, cup-shaped flowers in many coloursNarcissusSpring-flowering bulbs with trumpet-shaped blooms in white, yellow, and orangeBitter orangeThe citrus tree behind Seville orange marmalade and Neroli oilRoseWoody perennial plants with showy, often fragrant flowers in many colours

Also part of it, and being written: Hyacinth, Agave amica, Jasminum officinale.

Sources and further reading

• French formal garden on Wikipedia