VERSAILLES-LAND

Because of a growing number of flashy leisure-park like events calculated to draw a maximum number of tourists to the Château de Versailles coupled with increased visitors' amenities like rental golf carts and more and more souvenir shops, the historic domaine has become to be mockingly called in certain circles, Versailles-land. Add to that the controversy of dismantling the 19th century royal grille installed by Louis-Philippe in order to reconstitute the original baroque grille that had been removed by Louis XV, and you've got a long-lasting and good old-fashioned flap, or what the French call a polémique.


I'm not certain who coined the term Versailles-land, but it was used in 2007 in an article appearing in La Tribune de l'Art. 

iPhone photo by Ian Byrd

©2012 P.B. Lecron