The Chapelle Royale at Dreux

A memorial chapel built for royalty.

A 19th-century masterpiece, high above the city of Dreux, the beautiful Neo-Gothic Chapelle Royale is the funerary chapel of the Orléans family. It was built in remembrance of a royal family, devastated by the French Revolution but who would return to give France yet one more king, Louis-Philippe. It was Louis-Philippe who, in 1840, enlarged and renovated the chapel in homage to the restored monarchy.

The stained-glass windows by Delacroix, Ingres and Viollet-le-Duc were made at the Manufacture de Sèvres, makers of the famed porcelain. Certain windows tell the story of Saint-Louis, ancestor of the Orléans. And, being a mausoleum, you’ll see the life-like reclining marble figures known as gisants that rest atop the tombs. These are by some of France’s best sculptors of the 1800s, including Millet and Pradier, and are particularly beautiful and detailed.

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