Château de Dampont, Historic castle in Us, France

Château de Dampont is a stone château on the route de Marines in Us, Val-d'Oise, built 1852–1872 in an eclectic style, mainly Neo-Renaissance with Neo-Gothic elements, and attributed to Eugène Viollet-le-Duc. It centres on a tall four-level rectangular tower flanked by two smaller three-level square towers set at a 20° angle and linked by single-storey recessed elements. Corbelled bartizans, dormers with pointed triangular pediments and a garden-side double staircase serving a first-floor balcony decorate the ashlar facades.

Charles Guy de Kersaint, who inherited the Dampont lands through his wife Laure du Tremblay de Saint-Yon, had the château built between 1852 and 1872 on the site of the former Dampont manor. In 1908 Jacques Potin bought it from Raoul de Kersaint, and in 1911 he commissioned Édouard Redont to lay out the park. The building is attributed to Eugène Viollet-le-Duc and was listed as a monument historique on 24 October 2002.

The château is also called château du Héron, a name the sources record without explaining its origin. It has served as a film set: Michel Lemoine shot Les Week-ends maléfiques du Comte Zaroff there in 1976, Safy Nebbou filmed L'Autre Dumas in 2010, and the TF1 series Cat's Eyes used it as the home of art dealer Christian Dalembert in 2023-2024.

The château is listed as a historic monument, so it is worth checking in advance what areas are open to visitors at any given time. The park surrounding the building is worth walking through, and sturdy footwear is a good idea.

The château has served as a film set: it appears in Michel Lemoine's Les Week-ends maléfiques du Comte Zaroff (1976), in L'Autre Dumas by Safy Nebbou (2010), and as the home of the art dealer Christian Dalembert in the TF1 series Cat's Eyes (2023–2024).