On Tuesday afternoon we hopped on a train to Normandy to explore the towns of Giverny and Vernon, visit Monet's house and gardens and the Impressionist museum there. This trip had been recommended to us by our friends Amanda and Joe and my love of impressionism and recent amazement at the waterlilies in the Musée d'Orangerie put this excursion near the top of my list of things to do while in France.
We took the 12:20pm train from Saint-Lazare and 45 minutes later we arrived in Vernon, rented bicycles at the local pub and set off on a beautiful 4km bicycle path to Giverny. The weather was cloudy but warm, basically perfect for cycling.
Although I was very interested in seeing the real-life Monet gardens, I was also slightly apprehensive because I was pretty sure that they would be a let down compared to the paintings I have seen. I was also quite sure that any photos I took of the gardens would be nowhere near as nice as Monet's paintings. So, I decided that I would instead experiment with taking some impressionist style photos of the gardens. This is a quite a departure from my usual preference of perfectly focused photos, but I love setting myself little tasks with photography so I was excited to try it out. I've included some in-focus shots as well for those interested in seeing the comparison.
Here is the main garden from the upstairs window of Monet's house.
The house itself is fabulous, all the walls and mouldings are painted in bright colours, my favourite is the dining room. I would take this over Pottery Barn beige anyday!
This is my favourite flower, the dahlia, they were everywhere in the gardens (and in Paris!), one day I hope to have a garden full of them.
The next photos are of the famous waterlilie pond itself with the japonese bridge in the background (now quite overgrown with vines).
We also loved the apple trees in the garden, which have been pruned into low hedges.
My favourite cycling buddy.
Every time I am on the continent I happen on little scenes like this and can't believe that people actually live like this. They probably think nothing of sitting in this incredible garden at their completely perfect red and white polka dot table. That makes me so happy.
We then cycled around Vernon a bit and came across this funny little suspended house on the banks of the Seine.
The Vernon town centre is beautiful. Large parts of it were destroyed in WWII but what remains is still lovely. There was a little farmers market set up just beyond this street where we picked up a huge jar of local honey. Yummy.
The town square and beautiful medieval church. Nearly all the stained glass windows inside are modern because the 15th century originals were destroyed during the war.
We took the 12:20pm train from Saint-Lazare and 45 minutes later we arrived in Vernon, rented bicycles at the local pub and set off on a beautiful 4km bicycle path to Giverny. The weather was cloudy but warm, basically perfect for cycling.
Although I was very interested in seeing the real-life Monet gardens, I was also slightly apprehensive because I was pretty sure that they would be a let down compared to the paintings I have seen. I was also quite sure that any photos I took of the gardens would be nowhere near as nice as Monet's paintings. So, I decided that I would instead experiment with taking some impressionist style photos of the gardens. This is a quite a departure from my usual preference of perfectly focused photos, but I love setting myself little tasks with photography so I was excited to try it out. I've included some in-focus shots as well for those interested in seeing the comparison.
Here is the main garden from the upstairs window of Monet's house.
The house itself is fabulous, all the walls and mouldings are painted in bright colours, my favourite is the dining room. I would take this over Pottery Barn beige anyday!
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| photo from here |
A view of the house from the garden.
A lovely shot Graham took of a bee on a flower.
Here are some impressionist attempts
The ponds which inspired Monet's waterlilies are in a separate part of the property.
The next photos are of the famous waterlilie pond itself with the japonese bridge in the background (now quite overgrown with vines).
We also loved the apple trees in the garden, which have been pruned into low hedges.
After seeing the gardens we hopped back onto our bicycles and headed to the museum. The village of Giverny is incredibly picturesque.
My favourite cycling buddy.
At the museum there was a special exhibit of 70 paintings from the Clark Collection (based in Williamstown, USA). Many Renoirs to look at and we loved learning about the Clark family and their amazing art collecting.
On the way back we ventured off the main cycle path to this little track. It was lovely.
Every time I am on the continent I happen on little scenes like this and can't believe that people actually live like this. They probably think nothing of sitting in this incredible garden at their completely perfect red and white polka dot table. That makes me so happy.
We then cycled around Vernon a bit and came across this funny little suspended house on the banks of the Seine.
The Vernon town centre is beautiful. Large parts of it were destroyed in WWII but what remains is still lovely. There was a little farmers market set up just beyond this street where we picked up a huge jar of local honey. Yummy.
The town square and beautiful medieval church. Nearly all the stained glass windows inside are modern because the 15th century originals were destroyed during the war.
Thanks so much for the tip Amanda and Joe!!
p.s. For anyone interested in photography stuff, in order to get the impressionist feel I tried to fill the frame with my subjects (like Monet did!). To make my photos so blurry I adjusted my F-stop to the lowest number (=widest aperture) for a shallow depth of field and used manual focussing to further blurr the pictures. I also boosted the contrast a bit in iPhoto. If I try this again I will underexpose the photos a stop or two in order to get the darker shadows that I achieved by altering them in iPhoto. I don't usually process my photos but it seemed to help with achieving the effect this time. Any and all constructive criticism welcome!
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