Workshop Retreats

Four nights at the château, learning traditional crafts from people who still practise them. With brodeur d’art Nicolas Jover you embroider a brooch, bracelet or ornament drawn from the gilded detail of the eighteenth-century Salon de Musique, then make a plumier and a feather quill by hand. No experience is needed, most afternoons are your own, and every meal and drink is included.

The château’s first Noël atelier: four December nights as Gudanes fills with festive warmth. You embroider ornaments inspired by the Salon de Musique, pour candles scented with the château’s original eighteenth-century fragrance recipe, and set champagne jellies in antique copper moulds with the chefs. You go home with a stocking full of château memories.

Five nights in celebration of French cuisine. There are hands-on classes and demonstrations with the château’s chefs, sweet and savoury, some drawn from the château’s own eighteenth-century cookbook. Then come the rituals of the French table: dressed linens, silver and porcelain. It suits first-time cooks and accomplished ones alike.

Three nights for the romance of the French brocante. You wander antique markets, hidden antique shops and vide-greniers across the villages and valleys of the Pyrénées, looking for pieces with character and history. Back at the château there is a cooking class, then dinner and French cinema beneath the stars.

A week of long, golden summer days, balancing exploring with doing nothing at all. There are the valley’s brocantes and antique dealers, French cooking with the chefs, a day on the river or in the mountains, the restoration up close, and films beneath the stars. In between are the pool, the grounds and long dinners.