The French formal gardens on the north front

The formal gardens on the north and west sides of Chambord were restored a few years ago to their eighteenth-century layout: box-edged parterres, close-mown lawn panels, long gravel walks and alleys of clipped limes, laid out flat right up to the foot of the château. Before the restoration this was rough grass; now it is one of the largest French formal gardens in the country.

What it gives a photographer is geometry. The parterres provide strong repeating lines, the gravel walks give perfect leading lines to the building, and the clipped hedges are low enough that a couple stays visible from anywhere in the garden. Stand at the end of a walk and the whole composition converges on the château; step into the parterre paths and the box gives clean green framing at knee height.

Because the garden is flat and open, light is the only variable. Early morning and the last hour both rake across the parterres and throw long shadows that make the pattern read; midday flattens it entirely. The box and lawn stay green year-round, so this works in winter when the rest of the park is bare, and frost on the parterres on a cold morning is spectacular.

Practical: the gardens are inside the grounds, which have their own opening hours separate from the château ticket — check them. Stay on the gravel and the mown paths: the parterres are maintained planting, and box hedges take years to recover from being walked through. There is no shade at all out here, so summer midday is genuinely unpleasant as well as photographically flat.