Appartement du roi, Art museum in Palace of Versailles, France

The King's Apartment is a series of connected rooms on the first floor of Versailles Palace with marble panels, painted ceilings, and ornate furnishings. The spaces showcase the lavish decoration of the royal living quarters with their artistic details.

Louis XIV created this suite after the death of Maria Theresa in 1684, moving into rooms in the oldest part of the château that had belonged to the queen. His architect Jules Hardouin-Mansart remodelled them, and in 1701 the King's Bedchamber was built on the site of Louis XIII's salon du roi. The number of rooms fell from eight to seven in 1701 and to six in 1755.

The name of the Œil-de-Bœuf salon comes from the oval window in the south cove of its ceiling. Its gilt-stucco frieze shows dancing putti on a trellis background, a step toward the lighter Louis XV style. Veronese's "The Fainting of Ester" and "Judith with the Head of Holofernes" hung there as pendants.

The King's Apartment is reached from the Queen's Staircase, and its rooms overlook the Marble Court in the oldest part of the palace. The suite shrank from eight rooms to seven in 1701 and to six in 1755, so the sequence a visitor walks through today is shorter than the original enfilade. Look for the 1701 loggia, created by piercing the vestibule wall to light the staircase.

The bedchamber created in 1701 stands where Louis XIII's state drawing room once was; its three western windows were walled up to form the alcove, and a three-storey avant-corps with a gilt wrought-iron balcony was added facing the Marble Court. Louis XIV dined here at the petit couvert.