The garden
This garden is a tip of the hat to the literary and cinematic saga of Harry Potter, and more specifically to the power of the “pensieve”, a magical receptacle filled with its user’s thoughts and memories, which are deposited there in order for him or her to be free of them.
This particular “pensieve”, the garden’s pivotal point, both unites and separates two worlds: the world of shadows, dark and sinister, where our most tormented thoughts dwell, and the world of clear-sightedness, structured and reassuring.
In the forbidden forest, a reflection of how easily we give way to our own demons, dark-leafed plants with gnarled bark obscure the pathway to the other side. Suddenly, drawn by the glimmering of the grasses that cover the garden like vagabond thoughts, visitors reach the “pensieve”, reminiscent of an Arabo-Andalusian garden patio, ideal for reflection. A fountain flows at its centre, a symbol of thought in perpetual motion. Now everything seems clear and unobstructed: brightly coloured flowers are laid out in reasoned fashion, allegories of the wisdom that human beings may show when faced with life’s more delicate and threatening situations.
DESIGNERS
Bérengère LECAT and Stéphane LARCIN, landscape designers
FRANCE
Stéphane Larcin is fascinated by human sciences and architecture, predilections that he strives to highlight in his creative work. After seven years overseeing the implementation of musical and sports projects for a major Parisian venue, he decided to devote himself to garden design and enrolled at Versailles’s National Higher School of Landscape, of which he is a graduate. In his eyes, gardens transcribe the wonders of the natural world of plants, free and reflective.
Bérengère Lecat spent many years working for industrial companies and services, designing projects and overseeing their implementation. At the same time, her piano-playing and paintings showed her to possess powerful artistic sensibilities. Fascinated by the world of plants, she finally decided to make it all happen and enrolled at Versailles’s National Higher School of Landscape, of which she is a graduate. She likes to create gardens whose very essence is expressed in rhythms and harmonies, through colours, textures and architecture.
