Did you ever try and grow a hyacinth in your kitchen? If so, you certainly remember how fragrant a single bulb is. So imagine being seated on this green bench in Monet’s garden, wrapped by the scent of hundreds of hyacinths… This is an early April rapture at Giverny.
The brand of the bench, le banc idéal – the ideal bench – has nothing to do with the floral wonders of Giverny. But it sounds appropriate, doesn’t it?
Although the water garden designed by Claude Monet still looks very peaceful, everybody is working hard at Giverny. The Fondation Monet (his home and gardens) as well as the Musee des Impressionnismes Giverny reopen in ten days, on Friday, 25th March. It is earlier than normally, because Easter is especially early this year.
Just out of the Winter, the gardens are not overloaded with flowers, yet pleasant to walk around. They look fresh and shiny. The first signs of Spring can be noticed. Jonquils are already out, illuminating special spots with their bright yellow. I took the picture above this afternoon.
The Musée des Impressionnismes will display an exhibition of works by Gustave Caillebotte. This hugely talented impressionist was a keen horticulturist. His garden and rare flowers were among his favorite motifs.
This is not the winter we are having at Giverny this year. The last time Monet’s water lily pond looked that way was in 2012.
It was so beautiful then! I roamed in the gorgeous yet closed garden and couldn’t look and shoot enough.
The landscape turned white is not that frequent at Giverny. Although we do get a few flakes every winter and a few nights of frost, generally the weather is more humid than cold. It is overcast, it rains, but not cats and dogs, only kittens and puppies, you know.
Patience. All this will soon be over. Fondation Claude Monet opens rain or shine on March 25, 2016, and the seven-month flower show wil be more beautiful than ever.
Once a week, on Thursdays at 6.00 pm, a mass is celebrated in the church of Giverny. Everybody is most welcome, especially tourists, even if they are not Catholics, even if they don’t speak French, as long as they are respectful.
Expect locals to smile at you with some curiosity in the eyes. They are eager to know who you are and where you are from, but won’t ask.
The mass starts soon after the old bells stop chiming. There are two of them, a little one that has a high sound and a big one that is lower.
If you are like me, you will prefer not to sit on the first row of chairs, to mimic the faithfuls who know when to stand up or sit down. It feels good to be among them, because churches are not monuments only. Their stones retain all the faith of the humans who built them and prayed in them. The parishioners of today are their beating heart.
This is big and good news at Giverny: a bakery has opened! It is located in the main street rue Claude Monet in the direction to the church on number 73 Bis.
The last one closed decades ago, so it is a joy to see a bakery again in this little village of 500 inhabitants.
Nothing means life in a village more than a bakery and a school.
The bakery’s name, Au coin du pain’tre, is a pun. Au coin du pain would mean To the Bread’s Corner, but with an additional ‘tre ‘ it reads To the Painter’s corner, an allusion to the painting destiny of Giverny. Logically, the shop sign is in the shape of a palette. Artisan boulanger means that breads and pastries are home made.
When the museums are open, so is also the bakery, 7 days a week from 7.00 am to 8.00 pm. The bakery is established in a lofty shop that used to be successively a garage for renting 2CV cars, an antiques shop, and lately a restaurant. There is room enough for tables and a nice walled terrace, where the Coin du pain’tre also serves light meals.
Next to the former railway station of Giverny-Limetz now converted into a ‘salle des fetes’ (community hall), the big fir tree proudly sports Christmas light garlands.
In winter, simplicity and peacefulness reign in the little village of Claude Monet, inhabited by 500 persons only.
631 000 visitors flocked to the water lily pond in 2015, from late March to early November. Now that they have gone, it is like night after day, a time for relaxing and dreaming.
The Christmas tree shines for the Givernois (inhabitants of Giverny) and for the passersby driving on the Chemin du Roy.
Giverny was very peaceful but not totally desert this afternoon, due to a reasonably sunny Sunday.
The shutters on Monet’s house are locked for the winter.
Although it is not possible to enter any museum or garden, although cafés, restaurants and gift shops are closed, the village itself seems to attract people looking for a nice stroll.
Along the streets the flower beds continue to provide some flowers like sages, fuchsias, roses and dahlias.
They will resist until frost, or until the gardeners decide to pull them out.
One day, in the next months, they will be changed for spring flowers.
Here is my new perpetual calendar featuring Monet’s house and gardens at Giverny.
I have carefully selected my best photos among thousands of pictures I’ve taken over the past years in the famous painter’s gardens.
The shots follow the seasons. Page after page, day after day, you see how spring arrives and settles, gets to its glory, turns into summer and its plenty, until autumn comes with more flowers than ever and fabulous colors reflecting into the pond.
Winter has unexpected delights to offer, for instance the garden covered with snow, the frozen pond, or gorgeous sunrises over the Seine.
To make sure the new picture is a new surprise every day, landscape views alternate with flowers close ups, streets of Giverny with details of the house decoration, and more.
Each picture has a caption in English and in French.
The calendar has been designed and printed in France by a nature-friendly manufacturer.
The size is 15×12 cm, (4.7′ x 5.9′) including a white stripe at the bottom for your notes.
The price is 19 euros. I am happy to ship worlwide for an extra cost of 3.5 euros. For instance, total cost for the United States is 25 US$, or 17 £ for Great Britain, or 34 CAD, shipment included.
To order, just leave a comment and I will get in touch with you. Imagine this little window with lovely garden pics next to your computer or on your kitchen counter or anywhere else, like a breeze of fresh air…
At Giverny in Rue Claude Monet, one of the mail boxes to send letters and postcards is located amid flowers.
In October, the helianthus are big enough to reach the height of the mail box.
Their yellow hues match the official color of La Poste boxes.
Having to make your way through the flowers to post your mail makes paying the bills just a little more fun.
Seen on a map or from the windows of his home, Monet’s flower garden aligns straight lines that ressemble almost a grid. But because Monet raised the flower beds, an oblique look through the garden doesn’t reveal the walkways. Instead, it gives the feeling of an endless flowered meadow full of striking colors. Blues are made by forget-me-not, while tulips, fritillaries and pansies provide all the colors of the painters palette. (Click on picture to enlarge)
A beautiful exhibition has just started at the Museum of Impressionisms Giverny. Through 80 works signed Edgar Degas, (oil on canvas, pastel, brass, etc) it questions the painter’s membership in the group of the impressionists. His daring compositions, his motifs taking in the present day life, his free brushwork, last but not least his involvement in the organization of the impressionist exhibitions of the times make him an impressionist.
But Degas rejected open air painting, had a classical training, and hated the word impressionist itself. So was he, or not, an impressionist painter? Make your own opinion exploring this outstanding exhibition that displays many famous masterpieces, as well as less known works uncluding rarely seen Degas landscapes.
MDIG, 27 March-19 July 2015 More information
This picture was taken in one of the bedrooms of Monet’s home at Giverny. The house dates back to the mid-1800’s and most of the fixtures are still original, so I suppose this window handle is too. It is a very common model that can be seen in lots of houses of that time. Here it is painted the same pale blue as the window.
What is certainly much more recent are the curtains, although they look ancient and charming. But it is rare to find old curtains in good condition because the light and heat behind the window damage them rapidly. I suppose those were replaced at the restoration of the house in the 1970’s. They are machine made with sort of a floral pattern that resembles lace.
When I was a child I wondered. How can a curtain let us see through, but not enable people standing outside to peep in? Now I don’t any more. I take them for granted. A new surprise awaited me: I’ve realised since I work as a guide and chat with foreigners that curtains, especially lace curtains look french. Do you agree?
They also look country, in my opinion. I must confess that I am a big fan of the Country Living magazine, both the US and UK issues. It is very exciting to explore the country spirit overseas. To learn what people answer to the question ‘What makes my home country?’. Here the curtains would belong to these features. Monet’s house is at the same time a painter’s house, a house of the 19th century, the home of an upper-middle class family, and, being located in the country side, it is definitely a country house.
As long as the water is still cold, the algaes don’t feel like growing. They wait patiently for better times to come.
In March, the water of Monet’s pond is so clear that the bottom looks close, offering shamelessly all its details to the view.
The uneven surface of the layer of mud resembles the moon, with mysterious craters everywhere. The planters of water lilies pop up in this desert like a lunar buggy.
The brave first leaves have made their way through the water to reach the surface, looking for sun and energy. They are still purple but will soon turn green.
In back light, when the weather is fine, innumerable stars twinckle on the surface where the light kisses the water.
This crystal clear water is the show awaiting the first Giverny visitors. In April, days get longer, warmer, and the inviting sunbeams awake grass, flowers, trees and algaes alike.
Some years, the water looses its transparency and gets almost milky, to my delight, because I like the way it absorbs the colors, I find it lovely. After a while the water clears up again.
This is what Claude Monet could see when he gazed through his bedroom’s window in April. Last year spring was very early and the first colors were already there at the opening of the garden. Wallflowers make a striking effect combined with tulips, while daffodils and jonquils form islands of white and yellow flowers on the lawns. In the distance, the tall trees of the water garden don’t have any leaves yet. It is just a matter of days.
This picture was taken on January 1st at Giverny. Outdoors, under a mistletoe plant growing on a tree. Mistletoe is extremely common in our area and can be seen on a wide range of trees including poplars, apple trees, aspens or oaks.
As long as the leaves don’t hide it, mistletoe is very visible and puzzles many visitors. It is a parasite and it does kill the branches it grows on by being too greedy, but the tree itself generally resists. In the meanwhile, mistletoe offers bed and board to many birds. It is now considered an ecological keystone species.
As a guide, I was recently asked by a client if we also kiss under the mistletoe on New Year’s Eve. Actually, we do sometimes, although I doubt this habit belongs to the French folklore. But because we love kissing in France, any excuse for it is immediately adopted, of course. However to tell the truth, the clock striking midnight is enough to start the kissing party.
I wish you many opportunities for kissing this year and twelve months full of love, friendship and warmth. Have a wonderful year 2015!