Château Chesnel, Historical monument and winery in Cherves-Richemont, France.

Château Chesnel is a pale yellow stone château built between 1610 and 1625 in Cherves-Richemont, on the heights above the Antenne. Its long facade has a projecting central pavilion rising two storeys plus an attic under a low dark roof edged with a crenellated parapet topped by rounded stone finials, flanked by two lower end wings. Tall white-framed windows line the walls, cylindrical stone chimneys rise from the roofline, and a low balustraded terrace wall runs along the base behind a broad gravel forecourt. The square plan is enclosed by dry moats on four sides.

Charles de Chesnel, having inherited his mother's property, had the present château built between 1610 and 1625 in an Italian style imitated in Angoumois, near a 1505 dovecote on the La Roche estate. At the death of the last Chesnel in 1754 the estate was divided between his two sisters; it passed to a cousin and later to the counts of Roffignac.

The architecture blends residential comfort with decorative military features like moats, towers, and ornamental crenellations that visitors see today. This combination reveals how the owners wanted to display both power and refinement in their family home.

Visits run from 15 June to 15 September, and outside that window only by appointment. The château stands on the heights above the Antenne at Cherves-Richemont, near Cognac; the dry moats and the gravel forecourt are seen on foot.

A dovecote dated 1505 already stood on the La Roche estate before the château was built; it survives among the farm buildings to the right as you face the château. The dry moats enclose the square main building on all four sides.