France · Restored
Château de Vallery
The Château de Vallery is a French Renaissance château in Vallery, Yonne, erected from 1548 on the site of a medieval fortress to a design associated with Pierre Lescot. Built as two perpendicular ranges joined by a corner pavilion, it preserves curtain walls, circular towers and cellars from the medieval predecessor and displays brick-and-stone Lescot façades. It was a residence of the House of Condé until the 18th century and survives today after 20th–21st century restorations.
Its prime
1700
Today
Restored
As it stood in 1700
What Château de Vallery looked like in its prime.
Two perpendicular stone-and-brick ranges meet at a corner pavilion beside a wide grassy moat and low medieval curtain wall; façades alternate red brick panels with pale ashlar quoins and rusticated base stones. Long, low slate hipped roofs with dormer windows cap the ranges. A ground‑floor portico of round‑headed arcades with paired Tuscan pilasters opens to the courtyard; the moat‑facing wall is of rough limestone and flint rubble. Surviving circular towers punctuate the older fortified enclosure.
Its story
The story of Château de Vallery.
In the 12th century the site was probably a principal seat of the viscounts of Sens; the lordship then passed by inheritance and marriage through the lords of Vallery, among them the soldier Érard de Vallery, the Thianges family from about 1277 and the Poisieu family in the 15th century, until Jacques de Poisieu sold Vallery in 1548 to Jacques d'Albon de Saint-André, Marshal of France and favourite of Henry II, for 95,000 livres.
Saint-André commissioned the royal architect Pierre Lescot, then at work on the new Louvre, to build a Renaissance residence on the site of the old fortress, whose curtain walls, circular towers and cellars survive. Only the west wing, south wing and a corner pavilion were built before his death in 1562. Du Cerceau recorded the château in 1576 and compared it to the Louvre; its brick-and-stone polychromy, originally faced with red and black marble, became a model for the châteaux of the 17th century.
In 1564 Saint-André's widow, Marguerite de Lustrac, gave Vallery to Louis I de Bourbon, Prince of Condé, a leader of the Huguenots. It remained a residence of the House of Condé until 1747, a centre of Protestantism and the burial place of the Condé princes. Élisabeth Alexandrine de Bourbon-Condé, who held the estate from 1727, demolished the south wing, and Vallery later passed to the family of the Marquis de Sade. The Renaissance gardens were listed in 1946, the château and its dependencies in 2001.
Step inside
10 places to explore in 1700.
The record describes 10 distinct spots at Château de Vallery, including 2 interiors: grande galerie (ground-floor gallery), medieval vaulted cellars. Create your own photoreal reconstruction and explore every one, more scenes means more rooms, more angles, and more of the place to stand in.
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Recreate Château de Vallery with AI to explore it.
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Clans who held Château de Vallery.
The families that held Château de Vallery for a decade or more across its history, follow a name to its clan.
Thianges
Held the lordship of Vallery from about 1277.
Poisieu
Held Vallery in the 15th century, until Jacques de Poisieu sold it in 1548.
Albon
Bought in 1548 by Jacques d'Albon de Saint-André, Marshal of France; his widow gave it to Condé in 1564.
Condé
Residence of the House of Bourbon-Condé from 1564 to 1747, and burial place of the Condé princes.
Sade
Later held by the family of the Marquis de Sade.
