Maintenon, Centre-Val de Loire 28130

1 hour 15 minutes west of Paris, between Chartres and Rambouillet, a 17th-century village house restored with its walled garden. The street-facing façade, built of ashlar stone, limestone rubble, and exposed flint, rises two levels under a two-pitched roof with flat tiles, pierced by a hanging dormer. Invisible from the street, another zinc roof covers the rest of the house. Two bays protected by green wooden shutters punctuate the raised ground-floor façade, hidden from view due to the slope of the street. A small semicircular wooden door leads directly to a double vaulted cellar, while another, larger one with oak plank doors, hides a small courtyard enclosed by stone walls where the house entrance is found.