page_title: History of the Palace of Versailles
section_title: Louis XVI
hierarchical_section_title: History of the Palace of Versailles / Ancien Régime / Louis XVI
caption_attribution_description: This file was uploaded with Commonist.
context_page_description: The Palace of Versailles is a royal château in Versailles, in the Île-de-France region of France. When the château was built, Versailles was a country village; today, however, it is a suburb of Paris, some 20 kilometres southwest of the French capital. The court of Versailles was the centre of political power in France from 1682, when Louis XIV moved from Paris, until the royal family was forced to return to the capital in October 1789 after the beginning of the French Revolution. Versailles is therefore famous not only as a building, but as well as a symbol of the system of absolute monarchy of the Ancien Régime.
context_section_description: In 1774, shortly after his ascension, Louis XVI ordered an extensive replanting of the bosquets of the gardens, since many of the century-old trees had died. Only a few changes to Le Nôtre's design were made: some bosquets were removed, others altered, including the Bains d'Apollon (north of the Parterre de Latone), which was redone after a design by Hubert Robert in anglo-chinois style (popular during the late 18th century), and the Labyrinthe (at the southern edge of the garden) was converted to the small Jardin de la Reine. 
  The worsening finances of the French monarchy led to neglect in the maintenance of the Palace. Benjamin Franklin described an air of "magnificence and negligence" when he visited, while royal architects warned of the dangerous condition of outbuildings like the Petit and Grand Ecurie (stables), where rotting timber in 1770 necessitated urgent rebuilding work. 
  To compound the shortage of money, Louis XVI channeled significant financial resources into other properties, including the purchase and renovation of the Chateau de Saint Cloud in 1784, and an ongoing rebuilding of the Château de Compiègne throughout the 1780s.  This left scant resources available to devote towards the long-nurtured dream of rebuilding the Paris-facing wings of the Enveloppe enclosing the Marble and Royal Courts, known as the "Grand Project". In 1780 Louis XVI completed the Gabriel Wing reconstruction begun by his grandfather, and he had plans to extend the rebuilding. In 1779, the Royal Buildings Office invited architects to submit designs for the "Grand Project", the goal being to harmonize the new Neoclassical Gabriel wing with the antiquated Louis XIII style of the southern wing and the original hunting lodge façade on the Marble Court. Ultimately, the advent of the debt crisis in the French government in 1787 and the beginning of the French Revolution spelled an end to any such plans.
  In the interior of the palace, the library and the salon des jeux in the petit appartement du roi and the petit appartement de la reine, redecorated by Richard Mique for Marie-Antoinette, are among the finest examples of the style Louis XVI. Several stories for the petit appartement du roi were added above those already constructed by Louis XV, reaching six stories high. Louis XVI was known to walk on the roof and enjoy the commanding views, sometimes sitting with a telescope to peer at the courtiers milling around in the forecourts beneath him. These additional floors, which loomed awkwardly above the Cour de Marbre and the main roofline of the palace, were intended to be temporary pending the long-awaited Grand Project. They were demolished in the 19th century in order to restore the appearance of the façade as it existed under Louis XIV.
caption: The Cabinet doré, one of several rooms in the petit appartement of Marie Antoinette redecorated by Richard Mique in the Louis XVI style.
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