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Château de Gudanes
2 Route de Beille, Château-Verdun, Ariège 09310, France
A guide only. Every transaction is processed in euro, and your bank sets the rate on the day.
Les retraites
A few days of French country-house life, in a château brought back from ruin.
This is not a hotel stay, and it is not a course. It is the life of a French château as it was meant to be lived: unhurried mornings, long lunches, the market and the brocante, the kitchen, the apéritif, and dinner that lasts the evening.
You stay within the château itself, with a small company of guests and no one else. Each retreat has its theme: the kitchen, Christmas, the brocantes, the old crafts, or simply a French summer. Around it, the house does what it was built to do. Take part in everything, or nothing at all.
4 nights / 5 days
5 December 2026
Spent at the château
Four December days at home in the château: a gingerbread château to ice, a bûche with the pastry chef, vin chaud beside the cellar, French wines tasted by the fire, cocktails in the Château Bar, and a Christmas banquet followed by dancing.
5 nights / 6 days
25 June 2027
Transfers and excursions included
Five summer days with the château’s chefs and pastry chef: the market at dawn, French classics and recipes from the house’s eighteenth-century cookbook, the brocantes of Mirepoix, lunch in Foix and Ax, and a banquet to close.
3 nights / 4 days
3 July 2027
Transfers and excursions included
Three days of chiner in the markets, brocantes and vide-greniers of the Ariège, hunting for old French linen, copper and faïence, with lunch in Foix, long dinners at the château, and a last night to dress for.
7 nights / 8 days
10 July 2027
Transfers and excursions included
A week of French summer with everything: Mirepoix and the brocantes, the kitchen and the pastry kitchen, a morning with the restorers, Foix castle, the cave at Lombrives, lunch in Ax, the river, and a banquet and dancing to close.
Prices are charged in euros; other currencies shown are approximate.
Une journée à Gudanes A day at Gudanes
Bread and croissants from the village boulangerie, coffee on the terrace, and on some mornings the crêpe cart.
At the stove with the chefs, at the market with the producers, with a visiting artisan, or on the restorers’ scaffold.
A long table in the garden, or lunch out in the valley: Foix beneath its castle, or Ax-les-Thermes among the hot springs.
The pool and a glass of rosé, pétanque on the lawn, homemade ice cream, the library, or an easel and a box of watercolours. Or a brocante, or the great cave at Lombrives.
As the mountains turn blue: a Kir Royale, a Lillet tonic, the château’s own botanical syrups.
Several courses by candlelight, or the barbecue on the terrace, or the last-night banquet, dressed for the occasion. Then a French film under the stars, or dancing.
À table The table
In France, the table is the point of the day, and so it is here. The château’s chefs cook as a great French country house should. There is bread from the village boulangerie each morning, trout from the farm right beside the château, cheeses from the Ariège, produce from the morning’s market, pastries from our own pastry kitchen, and now and then a dish from the château’s eighteenth-century cookbook.
Some meals are long and easy: platters passed down a table in the garden, the barbecue on the terrace, a kitchen supper of what you cooked that afternoon. Most evenings are an occasion. Several courses are served by candlelight, perhaps a fillet of beef, a ballotine of guinea fowl or the trout from next door, with the silver laid and flowers down the table. There is local sparkling wine as you arrive, the wines of France at every meal, an apéritif at dusk, and nothing to pay at the end.
Chiner The art of the find
The French have a word for it: chiner, to hunt, unhurried, for beautiful old things. On market mornings across the Ariège the squares fill with dealers’ tables: linen sheets embroidered with forgotten monograms, copper pans, café-au-lait bowls, silver, faïence, gilt frames, the occasional portrait. We take you to the markets, the village vide-greniers and the dealers we know, and help you bargain in French. Much of what furnishes the château’s own rooms was found in just this way. Whatever you find comes home with you: a piece of France for your own table.
La soirée The evenings
Evenings at Gudanes begin in the salons, with an apéritif, and end late. There are French films under the stars, dinners in the village at two of the valley’s finest tables, and on the last night of every retreat a banquet in the Salon de Musique for which everyone dresses. When dinner is over, the candles are set aside and there is dancing. Bring something beautiful to wear.
La restauration Be part of it
Gudanes is a Class I Historic Monument, bought as a ruin in 2013 and brought back room by room, privately, without a single grant. Each retreat helps to bring back the next room. Each includes a tour of the rooms restored and the rooms still waiting. On the longer retreats, you spend a morning beside the restorers in the oldest part of the house, as frescoes hidden for generations return to the light. Very few people anywhere are ever invited to do this.
La vallée The valley
The Ariège is one of the quietest and most beautiful corners of France, and the retreats take you into it:
Revenir Why so many return
A great many of our guests return, some year after year, each time for a different retreat: Christmas one year, the kitchen the next, a French summer after that. In autumn 2026, every guest at the Autumn Atelier had stayed with us before. Couples, friends and those travelling alone are equally at home. The company is small enough that by the second dinner it feels like a house party among friends.
Tout compris Everything included
One price for all of it: your room in the château, every meal and every glass, the classes, the outings and, on most retreats, the journey from Toulouse. There is nothing to pay at the end.
Every date across the year, in one place. Choose a retreat above to narrow it.
Places are shown live. When a session reads as full, it is full — we do not overbook a château this size.
Noël at Gudanes
€3,200 per person · nothing to pay at the end
about €800 a night
Book these dates
Cooking in the Cuisine
€3,800 per person · nothing to pay at the end
about €760 a night
Book these dates
Antique & French Finds
€2,800 per person · nothing to pay at the end
about €930 a night
Book these dates
Seven Starry Nights
€4,800 per person · nothing to pay at the end
about €690 a night
Book these datesSide by side
A night's stay gives you a room in the château. A retreat gives you the château: the table, the brocantes, the restoration and the valley.
| Stay the NightRoom and breakfast | A RetreatLa vie de château | |
|---|---|---|
| Your room in the château | Included | Included |
| Breakfast | Included | Included |
| Lunch and dinner | Not included | Included Every meal |
| Drinks, alcoholic and non-alcoholic | Not included | Included |
| A tour of the château and its restoration | An extra, €50 per booking | Included |
| The classes and the outings: the kitchen, the brocantes, yoga, the river, the mountains, a barbecue | Not included | Included All optional |
| A last-night banquet in the Salon de Musique, then dancing | Not included | Included |
| Excursions | Booked separately | On the three-, five- and seven-night retreats |
| Transfers from Toulouse | Booked separately | On the three-, five- and seven-night retreats |
| The pool, the tennis court, the gardens | Included | Included |
| The lounge, board games, the terraces, the barbecue area and the grounds | Included | Included |
| Wi-Fi, in a common area of the château | Included | Included |
| Only the group in residence | Not included | Included No other guests while it runs |
| Length | From one night | Three to seven nights |
| Price | Per room, a night | Per person · nothing to pay at the end |
| See the rooms | See the dates |
En images In pictures
Long tables, candlelight, the kitchen and the valley, with the people who came.
Practical
Rooms
Three bathrooms on the ground floor, shared between the group. Prices are per person, sharing a room
To reserve
10% to reserve; the balance 30 days before. Booking inside 30 days? The whole amount is due then, not a deposit.
The stairs
No lift: every bedroom is reached by stairs. Pack lightly
Children
Eight and over
Heating
An electric blanket and a space heater in every room
Animals
Bruce, a French bulldog, and four cats live here. Tell us of any allergy when you register
Wi-Fi
In a common area of the château
Getting here
Toulouse-Blagnac is an hour and three quarters away
Groups
Groups and institutions can take a whole session for themselves. Ask us.
Before You Register
Yes. Write to us about a room.
Write to us; we can sometimes move you to another date.
Fit enough for the original staircase: there is no lift.
The Journal
What comes out from under the plaster, which room opens next, and when the retreat dates are released. Sent when there is something worth sending.
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Each retreat is small, dated, and lived in the château itself.
Monument Historique · Classé A Class I Historic Monument, restored under French heritage law since 2013
