(FIG. 23-12). The emphatically horizontal sweep of the 17th-century
facade brushed aside all memory of Gothic verticality. Its stately pro-
portions and monumentality were both an expression of the new of-
ficial French taste and a symbol of centrally organized authority.
VERSAILLES PALACE Work on the Louvre had barely begun
when Louis XIV decided to convert a royal hunting lodge at Ver-
sailles, a few miles outside Paris, into a great palace. He assembled a
veritable army of architects, decorators, sculptors, painters, and
landscape architects under the general management of Charles Le
Brun. In their hands, the conversion of a simple lodge into the palace
of Versailles (FIG. 25-32) became the greatest architectural project
of the age—a defining statement of French Baroque style and an un-
deniable symbol of Louis XIV’s power and ambition.
Planned on a gigantic scale, the project called not only for a large
palace flanking a vast park but also for the construction of a satellite
city to house court and government officials, military and guard de-
tachments, courtiers, and servants (undoubtedly to keep them all un-
der the king’s close supervision). Le Brun laid out this town to the
east of the palace along three radial avenues that converge on the
palace structure. Their axes, in a symbolic assertion of the ruler’s ab-
solute power over his domains, intersected in the king’s spacious bed-
room, which served as an official audience chamber. The palace itself,
more than a quarter mile long, is perpendicular to the dominant east-
west axis that runs through the associated city and park.
Every detail of the extremely rich decoration of the palace’s inte-
rior received careful attention. The architects and decorators designed
everything from wall paintings to doorknobs in order to reinforce the
splendor of Versailles and to exhibit the very finest sense of artisanship.
Of the literally hundreds of rooms within the palace, the most famous
is the Galerie des Glaces, or Hall of Mirrors (FIG. 25-33), designed by
Jules Hardouin-Mansart(1646–1708) and Le Brun. This hall over-
looks the park from the second floor and extends along most of the
width of the central block. Although deprived of its original sumptu-
ous furniture, which included gold and silver chairs and bejeweled
trees, the Galerie des Glaces retains much of its splendor today. Hun-
dreds of mirrors, set into the wall opposite the windows, alleviate the
hall’s tunnel-like quality and illusionistically extend the width of the
room. The mirror, that ultimate source of illusion, was a favorite ele-
ment of Baroque interior design. Here, it also enhanced the dazzling
extravagance of the great festivals Louis XIV was so fond of hosting.
VERSAILLES PARKThe enormous palace might appear un-
bearably ostentatious were it not for its extraordinary setting in the vast
park that makes it almost an adjunct. From the Galerie des Glaces, the
king and his guests could gaze out on a sweeping vista down the park’s
tree-lined central axis and across terraces, lawns, pools, and lakes to the
horizon. The park of Versailles (FIG. 25-32), designed by André Le
Nôtre(1613–1700), must rank among the world’s greatest artworks in
both size and concept. Here, the French architect transformed an entire
forest into a park. Although its geometric plan may appear stiff and for-
mal, the park in fact offers an almost unlimited assortment of vistas, as
Le Nôtre used not only the multiplicity of natural forms but also the
terrain’s slightly rolling contours with stunning effectiveness.698 Chapter 25 NORTHERN EUROPE, 1600 TO 170025-32Aerial view (looking west) of the palace and gardens, Versailles, France, begun 1669.
Louis XIV ordered his architects to convert a royal hunting lodge at Versailles into a gigantic palace and park with a satellite city whose three radial
avenues intersect in the king’s bedroom.