The 16thC château is of secondary interest to the glorious gardens at Villandry. You don’t have to be a gardener to be bowled over by this fabulous reconstruction of a Renaissance garden in three parts, the most ravishing of which is the jardin potager (kitchen garden). Some 85,000 vegetable plants have been laid out in intricate geometric patterns between box hedges with feathery borders of golden celery and silver leeks. Exotic cabbages reveal frothy cream or violet hearts and the scent of roses is carried on the breeze. Not a potato in sight, of course, for they were yet to be introduced from the New World.

To decipher the hidden allegories of the ornamental gardens (one a tale of love, the other a musical composition), it is necessary to climb the belvedere. Behind them, the water garden is arranged in neat gravelled paths and lawns around a large pool.