Was This Dinner Party a Success?

Vaux-le-Vicomte 
a chateau 55 km southeast of Paris 
built for the aristocrat 
Nicholas Fouquet
 superintendent of finances for Louis IV.  
It was constructed from 1658 to 1661.
Three very talented men were brought together to create the home and gardens:  
architect Louis Le Vau, landscape architect Andre de Notre, 
and painter-decorator Charles Le Brun. 

When the project was completed the Fouquets entertained the King and other guests with an amazing dinner in a remarkably beautiful chateau, a walk through elaborate gardens, a play by Moliere, and finally a fireworks display.  The Fouquets went to bed very happy that night congratulating themselves on a tremendously successful evening only for Nicholas to be arrested a short time later.  As Voltaire put it:

"On 17 August, at six in the evening Fouquet was the King of France: at two in the morning he was nobody."

I guess it didn't pay to outshine the Sun King.  (There were also people at court plotting against him.)  Fouquet was sentenced to life in prison.  The king took Fouquet's team of designers and had them transform his father's hunting lodge into Versailles.  He also confiscated the decor of the chateau and even the orange trees. 

Wedding Party in Traditional Clothes

Gordon and Meg by the Stables

On Saturday nights for several months of the year you can visit Vaux-le-Vicomte by candlelight.  About 2000 candles are lit for this event.  It makes it even easier to imagine the splendor of the night so long ago.  The last Saturday of the month the evening concludes with a firework display just as did that August evening in 1661. What an unforgettable time to visit one of the most influential chateaus in France!