who was the palace of versailles built for
Palace of Versailles First built by Louis XIII in 1624 as a hunting lodge of brick and stone, and designed by the architect Jacques Lemercier, the edifice was enlarged into a royal palace by Louis XIV.[2] The first phase of the expansion (c. 1661–1678) was designed and supervised by the architect Louis Le Vau. It culminated in the addition of three new wings of stone (the enveloppe), which encompassed Louis XIII's original building on the north, south, and west (the garden side). André-Charles Boulle, the most famous French cabinetmaker and the preeminent artist in the field of marquetry,[3] was engaged in 1669 to create ouvrages de peinture, and Boulle was employed for many years at Versailles, where the mirrored walls, floors of wood mosaic, inlaid paneling and marquetry in the Cabinet du Dauphin (1682–1686) was regarded as his most remarkable work.[4] The rooms were dismantled in the late 18th century and their unfashionable art broken up.[5] More recently, a partial inventory of the Grand Dauphin's decorations at the Palace of Versailles has come to light at the National Archives in Paris.[6]
Palace of Versailles The Fifth Republic has enthusiastically promoted the museum as one of France's foremost tourist attractions, with recent figures stating that nearly five million people visit the château, and 8 to 10 million walk in the gardens, every year.[20][21] In 2003, a new restoration initiative – the "Grand Versailles" project – was started, which necessitated unexpected repair and replantation of the gardens, which had lost over 10,000 trees during Hurricane Lothar on 26 December 1999. The project will be on-going for the next seventeen years, funded with a state endowment of €135 million allocated for the first seven years. It will address such concerns as security for the palace and continued restoration of the bosquet des trois fontaines. Vinci SA underwrote the €12 million restoration project for the Hall of Mirrors, which was completed in 2006.[22]
Palace of Versailles The Palace of Versailles (French: Château de Versailles; English: /vɛərˈsaɪ, vɜːr-/ vair-SY, vur-;[1] French: [vɛʁsaj]) was the principal royal residence of France from 1682 under Louis XIV until the start of the French Revolution in 1789 under Louis XVI. It is located in the department of Yvelines, in the region of Île-de-France, about 20 kilometres (12 miles) southwest of the centre of Paris.[2]
St James's Palace Built by King Henry VIII on the site of a leper hospital dedicated to Saint James the Less, the palace was secondary in importance to the Palace of Whitehall for most Tudor and Stuart monarchs. The palace increased in importance during the reigns of the early Georgian monarchy, but was displaced by Buckingham Palace in the late-18th and early-19th centuries. After decades of being used increasingly for only formal occasions, the move was formalised by Queen Victoria in 1837. Today the palace houses a number of official offices, societies and collections and all ambassadors and high commissioners to the United Kingdom are still accredited to the Court of St James's.