Château d'Issou, 18th-century château in Issou, France

Château d'Issou is a castle complex in a French village with architectural elements from the 16th century onward. The property contains a cylindrical dovecote and a square tower that survive from its feudal origins.

A medieval castle stood here from around 1399; of the 16th-century feudal manor only a square tower and a round dovecote remain. In 1724 Pierre-François de Seré de Rieux bought the fief and had the present classical-style château built, possibly by architect Jean-Baptiste Leroux. The duke of Bouillon acquired it in 1751 and received ambassadors and Mme de Pompadour there. Enlarged with two pavilions in 1857, it was bought in 1873 by Gaston-Marcellin Dejean, vicomte de Jean, later mayor of Issou.

The château appears in Camille Claudel, partly filmed here in 1987, and later in Le Pacte des loups, along with short films featuring Yves Pennay. The 1739 remark of the French ambassador's wife in Sweden, "Cet endroit est le plus joli du monde", is often quoted about the estate.

The château has been abandoned since 1976 and is closed to visitors; its floors have collapsed, the roof leaks and the windows are broken. The surrounding eleven-hectare park, listed since 1974, is the part that can be walked. A tarpaulin installed after the 2018 heritage lottery protects the openings.

The Latin motto "Horas Non Numero Nisi Serenas" ("I count only the serene hours") is said, by legend, to have been left on the round dovecote by the Marquise de Pompadour, a guest of the château in the mid-18th century.