Château de Clermont, 17th-century castle in Le Cellier, France

Château de Clermont is a 17th-century castle in Le Cellier built in the Louis XIII style with pink brick walls accented by white stone and steep slate roofs featuring symmetrical wings. The main building stands on elevated ground with views across the Loire River valley.

René Chenu, lord of Lendormière and governor of Oudon and Champtoceaux, built the château from 1643 to 1649 on the site of the Mont-Clair monastery, destroyed by the Normans in 845. It stayed with the Chenu family for two centuries, was seized during the Revolution, passed to the Juchault des Jamonières, then to the Nau de Maupassant family in 1861. Louis de Funès, whose wife Jeanne Barthélémy inherited a share in 1963, bought the rest at a candle auction in 1967.

The château's name comes from the Mont-Clair monastery destroyed by the Normans in 845, on whose site it was built. The Chenu family, its builders, added the name Clermont to their own. In 1925 Charles Nau de Maupassant had the chapel decorated by Albert and Paul Lemasson, the same painters who made the Saint-Martin fresco in the church of Le Cellier that year.

The south facade looks over the Loire and the Mauges and Pays de Retz landscapes. The château stands in Le Cellier, surrounded by a 3-hectare park and a 17-hectare vineyard. Visitors approach on foot along the straight gravel path that leads to the central entrance door.

Louis de Funès bought the remaining shares of Clermont at a candle auction in 1967, after his wife Jeanne had inherited half from her aunt Marie Barthélémy in 1963. Only the success of the film "The Mad Adventures of Rabbi Jacob" allowed the couple to renovate the estate. De Funès died there in 1983.