The castle of Rivau…

Général

The Rivau garden side

Enjoy the calm of gardens imagined as paintings, real kaleidoscopes changing with the seasons. The spectacle of flowering is an enchantment to discover or rediscover. It is naturally accompanied by an olfactory tasting, as you stroll through the 16 gardens of the Château, where the beautiful iconic flowers mix their scents with rarer varieties. Not to mention a family of peacocks, full of color and intonation, who will sprinkle the show with magic as they gracefully greet visitors.

Inside the park, daring sculptures will surprise you! Giant watering cans, monumental boots, or even gigantic pairs of legs: the works signed by renowned contemporary artists will obviously amaze you. Thus, in 2023, two new creations by Julien Des Montiers and Laurent Pernot joined the fairy-tale gardens of Le Rivau.

Exhibition 2024: “Effervescences at Château du Rivau”

From 30 March to 11 November, an art exhibition invites you to discover the work of 40 artists*, both renowned and emerging, on the effervescence of society through different media. What are the new ways of thinking? How have our lifestyles changed? The artists decipher changes in society (artificial intelligence, buzz, the environment, over-medication…) while opening the doors to the marvellous.

Created by Patricia Laigneau, the exhibition’s curator, the six chapters reflect the artists’ prophetic vision or their commitment to the future of the planet. Effervescent, art immersed in reality becomes exhaustive. Over the years, art has sparkled in each new exhibition at Château du Rivau, while the gardens have been bursting with plant life.

* David Altmejd, Carlos Aires, Elodie Antoine, Gilles Barbier, Pauline Bazignan, Romain Bernini, Bianca Biondi, Michel Blazy, Corinne Borgnet, le duo Broadbeck et de Barbuat, Sylvain Ciavaldini, Bryan Crockett, Alain Delorme, Hélène Delprat, Marie Denis, Mathieu Dufois, Lionnel Estève, Richard Fauguet, Raymond Hains, Sheila Hicks, Laurie Karp, Christian Marclay, Philip Markiewicz, Eugenio Merino, Robert Montgomery, Meret Oppenheim, Laurent Pernot, Till Rabus, Antoine Roegiers, RU Xiao Fan, Jeanne Susplugas, Rikrit Tiravanija, Nicolas Tourte, Georges Tony Stoll, et Jean-Luc Verna.

A gourmet restaurant: the Secret Garden

In the heart of the castle’s courtyard, in a green cradle of vines and rosebushes, the Rivau restaurant offers creative and refined cuisine with vegetables and edible plants from the garden. Chef Andrea Modesto invites you to enjoy a unique culinary experience that blends local produce, vegetables and flowers from the Rivau gardens with the flavours of his native Italy.

In the Rivau’s vegetable garden, old and indigenous vegetables from the Centre-Val de Loire region are grown organically with love. The menu changes according to the vegetables grown. Since July 2020, a garden of edible wild plants also allows dishes to be enhanced with the flavors of wild plants. As for the wine list, it is composed of wines from the Loire Valley, in the same spirit of proximity.

Lunch in the secret garden

From the vegetable garden to the plate: the table of the fairies

For lunch, there’s nothing like a fresh dish straight from the castle’s organic vegetable garden! La Table des fées offers salads, soups, quiches and cakes made from our own vegetables or those of our neighboring farmers. It’s a simple meal, but very fresh with total control of the origin. La Table des Fées is Green Key certified and offers vegetarian, vegan and gluten-free options.

Alongside the organic vegetables from the Ferme du Rivau, and the Chinon wine produced from the château’s vineyards, the meat comes from neighboring farmers in order to offer simple, fresh and healthy products. This approach also aims to maximize the earnings of the neighboring farmers and thus support the territory. It is fully anchored in a Sustainable Development approach.

La table des fées – The table of fairies

The Rivau hotel, just to live the life of a castle!

The emotion of an escapade, thought for you, in the incredible setting of the architectural jewel of our 4 star hotel.

Enjoy the French art of living, in a spirit that is both chic and relaxed, between tradition and modern comfort. Excellence and fantasy are on the agenda today! Each room of the hotel is named after an emblematic historical figure and plunges you into a world where gold, celadon and other colorful touches enhance the charm of the beautiful fabrics, the stylish furniture and the family memories…

Stroll through these former royal stables as if in an art gallery where the original spirit of the place is embodied by a collection of contemporary works to the glory of the horse. For those who enjoy special moments, explore the gardens when the castle gates are closed to the public or discover the rare spectacle of daybreak from your windows.

A committed castle

More than an enchanted place, it is a castle committed to sustainable development. The Rivau castle do its utmost to create a natural balance within our gardens and seek to raise awareness of ecological concerns among future generations.

La Table des fées has obtained the Green Key label. The Secret Garden is now an ambassador for the C du Centre brand. With the organic agriculture practiced by the Rivau farm, it is a whole virtuous ecosystem that lives around the castle.

Waste management, selective sorting, composting and limiting packaging are also well established practices, as is drip irrigation to limit water consumption. Other points of attention: a moderate consumption of electricity and gasoline, the use of mechanical weeding, and the recycling of bulbs.

Finally, families and schoolchildren are made aware of the problems of plants, and of the actions to be taken in their daily lives for the well-being of all.

The edible flower garden