At Home in the Loire Valley with Timothy Corrigan in his new old chateau

When you were shopping for Chateaus and you were spending the day, this was the first or the last one that you saw? This was actually the last one of three that I'd seen on that day and I'd been looking for actually a couple months. But when I saw it, I absolutely knew and I told the broker, I want to make an offer on it. Timothy, having seen your other amazing Chateau, I didn't understand why you sold it. But now I understand this one is so interesting architecturally. It's quirky. It's fascinating. Just I haven't even gone inside yet. Well, it's a real fixer-upper, but what's so interesting about it is it has so much character and so much charm. So much character. I'm actually going to take off all the shutters. The shutters were added in the 19th century, but beneath them you'll see the beautiful 18th century window surrounds all in stone. So I think it's going to be much prettier once all the shutters come off. Look at this amazing staircase. I mean, it's so beautiful. And it has the family crest and the family initials on it throughout the entire staircase. So one of the reasons that I really fell in love with the house is the incredible quality of the boiserie or the wood panel. You can see this is all incredibly hand carved, it's all period of Louis XV. That's crazy. But just look at the incredible carving. And once the layers of paint come off this, you'll get even more details than you see right now. So that's my next question. When you say fixer-upper, on a room like this, what needs to be done? What are you going to do? You actually have to remove all this paint with a heat gun. So you'll get hundreds of years of paint, layer upon layer, and we'll see all different colors that was painted over the hundreds of years. So let's go into the salon. And again, all these rooms, as typical, had double sets of doors. For the heating? For the heating and also for privacy. What's the heating going to be like? God only knows what the heating is going to be like. But this room I particularly love because look at over the doors. Each of the over doors have this incredible carving of the women. And they represent, on this side, they represent the four seasons. And on the other side of the room, you get the four arts. Art and science and literature, et cetera. It's very rare to find this kind of detailing. But what's even more rare is to find this kind of detailing in this size chateau. You would usually find it in one of the royal chateaus, one of the big chateaus. Right. But to find this level of detailing in a smaller chateau is really extraordinary. So all of these rooms go on to this gallery, which all have French doors going outside. So it's this wonderful sort of long gallery. With bookcases and the French doors. But then you look out and look. Isn't that fabulous? That view looking out. And you might, you said you're going to put a reflecting pond? I'm thinking about putting a reflecting pond right in this very center here. A long reflecting pond. So this is going to be the TV room library. It was originally the billiards room. All the details in this room and the next room we're going to go to are all from the empire period. These rooms were redone around 1810. It was when Napoleon was in power. He'd gone and invaded and successfully conquered Egypt. And he brought back all the imagery of Egypt and the Egyptian empire to really sort of establish himself as the new emperor. This is going to be my office. Oh my gosh. Let me open the windows because it really makes a difference. Again, what kind of renovation will go on here? So again, this is all from the empire period. So that's where you're seeing a lot of the, again, the Egyptian columns, etc. And this will be my office. And you've got to look at the floor because this has, right in the center of the floor, has the family initials. Let's look at this view again. This is one of the best views. That's amazing. And those statues are all original. And all over the property. So you see my bedroom would be right here in the little folly. Look at these amazing deep doors and all the incredible details. This goes into the formal dining room. And again, a total jewel box. The boiserie here is some of the finest I've ever seen. I mean, look at this detail. The bird carved out of wood. The details on the leaves, which are totally three-dimensional. I mean, it's just extraordinary. Extraordinary boiserie. So this was one of the small ways to go into the chapel. You didn't want to leave the house. So come on in. I mean, just look at this incredible ceiling. And it's got really important stained glass windows that were added in the late 19th century. And again, you can see the family crest. It's throughout all the stained glass windows. And look at the reflection of the sun coming through. I mean, they really committed to this chapel. Absolutely. The altar is actually Venetian from the 18th century. And again, just all this incredible carving and beautiful detail. Now, when you said that she could come from her master bedroom, is she up there? She'd go up through there. Oh, wait. I want to go up these stairs. May I? Please. So she would go outside? Outside. She wanted to come in from her own bedroom. She'd come out her own little entrance. And she'd be able to come directly in here. Is it OK to open this? Absolutely. Oh, my gosh. So the bedroom is right there. And then it's outside. It's outside. Exactly. But it's all a little walkway. Now we're going into the master wing. So we're going to try to go up here. I'm going to have my own little mini kitchen over here. Just so that I don't want to go to the main part of the house. Right. I got this kitchen. I'm actually going to try to keep this tall. It's so charming. OK. Because we're right near where your new office is. Where my office is, yes. OK. So you have to really look at these extensive plans of how this house is, the chateau, and figure out where's the heart of my place. Exactly. And how to make it work for the way I want to live in it. And I think that's the secret of every house is figure out how you want to live in a house as opposed to let that house tell you how to live. So we're not actually in the chateau anymore. This is actually one of the buildings that's connected to the chateau. But this was the original artist studio, which was sort of built as a folly. And it's going to become my master bedroom. Come on, I want to show you upstairs and all the different bedrooms. Let's go to the first bedroom. And this would have been the bedroom that the lady in the house used. You see, here's the door where she had her own little pathway to the chateau in case she wanted to go at any time of the day or night. Let's open the entrance to this bedroom. And this room has its own terrace. So sorry, this is going to be the bathroom? This is the bathroom. And you'll get to open and enjoy this? And go out to the terrace. So romantic. And I don't know if you can see, but at the very far end of that LA, way out in the center is a beautiful big sculpture, beautiful of a woman and a fountain. I want to go to there. We will go there. I have to see that. We will go there. I just love the view from here. Come see. And there's the canals. Tell me about the canals again. So the canals were, the whole gardens were redesigned around the late 19th century by a man, a garden landscape designer named Edouard André. He designed all of the Tuileries gardens in Paris. And he is the one who introduced the canals here to the chateau. So rowboat added to the list? Rowboat, you got to get a rowboat. So this could be my new favorite room. Okay, stop. Just one moment. I know this is your area of expertise. I'm sure everyone is wondering this. How do you begin to decorate a house of this size? Do you, where do you begin? You don't get everything all at once. Do you get, I saw you with a lamp this morning. You borrowed and bought a lamp for this fireplace. I've actually been starting to buy things for the last year or so for this. And I literally just buy what I love. When I see something, I love it. I buy it. And it's really later where I figure out exactly where it's going to go. Because I think that's part of the fun of a place like this is it sort of evolves as you create it. It becomes what it's going to be. And I know you always love the process as much, if not more than the end result. Not that you're going to be moving from here anytime soon once you finish it. But having you loved this journey thus far? To me, it's all about the process. It's all about the train ride, not about the station. So this was originally the orchard and the potager, the cutting garden. So it's all totally enclosed so that animals wouldn't get in and eat all the fruit. We just saw a deer. We didn't see a deer. But actually, the fences are down now. And it's actually quite far away from the house. So you would actually think that this was a ruin. But it's, in fact, a folly that was added in the 18th century where they actually created these structures and buildings, these little bridges, and a fountain. So this was another one of the follies that was built in the 18th century. And you can see all the beautiful stonework. And there was a fountain in the back of it. So some of these trees have not been really tended for 100 years, it seems like. And all this kind of ivy, you have to take off because it kills the trees. So I've been slowly taking them all off. And sometimes they're so strong, I feel like Tarzan swinging. Are you going to attempt to mow all this? No. No, this would be way too much to mow because there's around 20 acres just here of fields. So what I'm actually going to do is I'm getting sheep in here. There will be a here and on the other side. How are you going to take care of sheep? You have a Los Angeles program. There actually are farmers who will let you, they'll take the sheep, they'll take care of the sheep. And they're here all summer. And they'll actually take care of mowing the lawn for you. It's like perfect, a win-win. Win-win for everyone. And I love the look of sheep in the distance. So because I consider Stacey and I your first unofficial guest. My first official guest. OK, official version. This makes it really official. Oh my goodness, thank you. I'm so excited. Very excited. Hang on. I'm just going to rip it with a bandage. Oh my goodness. Oh, thank you, my first guest book. And you have to sign it. But wait, open it too. Oh, thank you so much. It's fabulous. May you be the first to sign it. Yes, thank you so much. Thank you.