15 minutes from our lodgings locations-06.fr, the village of Valbonne has preserved the charm of a traditional Provencal village where all the streets are more beautiful than the others. Each facade is colorful, each door is well preserved. The atmosphere is pleasant, jovial, and in the evening we like to eat on the terraces, the children playing all together.
Discover and visit Valbonne
The reunion of Provence with France by Louis XI was the prelude to the renaissance of the region. By the will of the monk of Lérins, prior of Valbonne, Dom Antoine Taxil, the village was born in 1519 from an economic obviousness: to develop the lands of the abbey. An orthogonal plot was created and an original solution was found: local investors, clerics and notables, assignees of the lots, would rent them with the land attached to them to peasants, who came mainly from the Haut-Pays to cultivate the landed heritage, it being up to them to build the houses. A deed of habitation describes the rights and duties of the new inhabitants but also the architectural details, according to a rigorous “specifications”. The construction would take place over a century. The village would remain rural and relatively isolated, almost without change, until the middle of the 20th century. The proximity of the coast and, above all, in the 1970s, the creation of the university, scientific, technological and residential center of Sophia Antipolis, built largely on the Valbonne forest, transformed the region.
On an orthogonal plan, around the Place des Arcades, built at the beginning of the 17th century, five streets descend from north to south, ten streets from east to west, two canes wide (about four meters), crossing at right angles, forming a checkerboard plan which gives a characteristic image of Valbonne from the sky. The same rigor is found in the plan of the tall and narrow houses, originally all identical: a ground floor served as a storage room which today is found in a semi-basement, due to the raised street level; on the first floor the “room”, living room; above the bedrooms, and finally the attic where the reserves were stored hoisted using a pulley, some of which can still be seen. On the main street is the old town hall with its tower and fountain built in the 19th century.
The abbey church
The 13th century Romanesque abbey church, which became a parish church when the village was built, is a perfect example of Chalaisian art, very close to primitive Cistercian art. The bell tower was added in the 19th century. Several chapels and oratories, in the village and in the countryside, complete the religious architecture.
The well-preserved convent buildings, whose restoration began in 1970 and is still ongoing, house the heritage museum “Le Vieux Valbonne” which presents numerous objects, utensils and tools representative of rural life in the village and brings to life, through presentations and works, the history of the village and the monastic order of Chalais.
Festivals and festivities in Valbonne
Feast of St Blaise (end of January): In order to help preserve rural and cultural heritage, the Municipality created a communal vineyard in 1995. 300 vines of a late grape called Servan were planted in a suitable location. The vine now produces several hundred kilos of grapes. It is mainly used to delight gourmets on the occasion of Saint Blaise, the great festival of local products at the end of January in the Village.
St Roch Festival (early August): A major popular summer festival, St Roch offers several days of festivities, balls, country meals, boules competitions, and games for children.
