Château de Selles-sur-Cher

Château de Selles-sur-Cher (French pronunciation: [ʃɑto də sɛl syʁ ʃɛʁ]) is a castle (château) located in the commune of Selles-sur-Cher, Loir-et-Cher, Centre Region, France. The château is privately owned and is a designated historical monument of France.

Structures have been on the site as far back as the late 10th century, when Theobald I, Count of Blois, built a dungeon into the mound. Around 1140, Ginon de Mehun built a fortified castle on the site. In 1212, Robert de Courtenay of the Capetian House of Courtenay built a new castle with three corner towers and a gatehouse.

In the second half of the 16th century, the north and south pavilions and a south gatehouse were built, most likely for the de Trémouille family, lords of Selles. The pavilions, main entrance and interior of the 13th-century gatehouse were redesigned in 1612 for Philippe de Béthune, count of Selles, by architect Jacques Androuet II du Cerceau.

In 1719, Anne-Marie-Louise de Béthune, sister of the queen of Poland, sold the castle to Cardin Lebret, count of Selles. In 1810, Armand-Louis-Jean de Jehannot, Marquis de Bartillat, owned the castle and began significant renovations. However, in 1813 the Bande noire destroyed the west gallery. Starting in 1880, the castle underwent significant restoration work under the du Moulinet d'Hardemare family. Architect Pierre Chauvallon led a major restoration of the château in 1913.

The castle had been abandoned by 2002. It was purchased by Michel Guyot and his wife, Noémi Brunet. Guyot has done restoration work on previous castles, including Château de Saint-Fargeau, and is behind the Guédelon Castle project. In 2012, it was opened to the public. Later that year, they sold it to Nicolas Mazzesi and his wife Katherine Wu, who plan to open a winery on the site. The château hosts festivals and other events, and is the first tourist site in France to offer a virtual reality tour.

In early 2016, Georg Kabierske, a German history of art student from the University of Heidelberg, who had viewed the châteaux of the Loire Valley via Google Earth, discovered a previously unknown map of Château de Selles-sur-Cher drawn by Swedish architect Carl Johan Cronstedt (1709–1779).

Text adapted from “Château de Selles-sur-Cher” on Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0.

Château de Selles-sur-Cher ranks #3,929 of 7,738 worldwide in the atlas's castle fame ranking, and #307 of the 469 mapped in France. Founded 1612, it is older than 31% of the atlas's dated landmarks — one of 580 atlas entries founded in the 17th century. 4 more atlas landmarks stand within 25 km. The nearest day-trip guide is Blois, 39 km away. It is one of the 58 landmarks on the atlas's regional map of the Loire Valley. See how France compares in the castle statistics.

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Read the full history on Wikipedia ↗