Colette and the Corrèze

The Jardins de Colette, located near the Château de Castel-Novel (where she lived), retrace the life of this famous 20th-century novelist.

Colette's arrival at Castel Novel

Colette is in love. She had just met her second husband, Henry de Jouvenel, a politician and editor-in-chief of the newspaper Le Matin. They arrived in Varetz at the Château de Castel Novel, and Colette was immediately attracted by the pink building, by the nature that surrounded it, by the thousands of collection roses that filled the air with their fragrance, and by the bees that buzzed and buzzed. Colette loved nature and made no distinction between humans, animals and flowers. For her, everything is a source of wonder: flowers, cats, birds, butterflies, the sun on the wheat, the rain that makes pearls.

The writer's life in Corrèze

Colette was 40 when she discovered Corrèze. Her mother, Sido, had just died and she herself became the mother of a beautiful, chirping little girl, full of strength and with full, red cheeks. Colette was madly in love with her husband, whom she nicknamed "Sidi", "my master".

In Corrèze, she discovered her favourite cook Pauline, from Dampniat near Brive, who would follow her everywhere for 38 years, right to the end. Colette loved all pleasures, especially good food. She couldn't live without Pauline.

By the time she arrived in Corrèze she had already had several lives, she had known several regions, all revealed by love. The Burgundy of her childhood near her mother Sido, the Franche Comté of Willy her first husband, the Brittany of her love affair with the Duchess de Morny. After Jouvenel's Corrèze, she met Provence thanks to her third husband. Then she ended her life in the gardens of the Palais Royal in Paris.

Les Jardins de Colette: a tribute to the life of the novelist

This is the story that the Jardins de Varetz tell in flowers. Five hectares designed in 2008 by landscape architect Anouk Debarre. Colette had a collection of butterflies, and the wicker maze took their shape.

Six lives, six gardens: Colette's Gardens.

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