The Stables at Chaumont

The stables date from the 19th century. The courtyard is graced with an arched entrance. The riding school is on the right and the stables in front and to the left. They consist of stalls and some loose boxes for ponies. The floors are all tiled and the walls ceramic tiled. The fittings are all iron with brass decoration with mangers running along the back. Each horse has his name above his stall and the motive of the owners of the Chateau.

Also there is a carriage house and a large tack room where harness and tack would have been cleaned in the proximity. Activity would have been considerable and a large staff involved in the care and driving the carriages and they would have all been in livery. The bedding would have been reaped straw long and undamaged and would have lasted for days, unlike our straw today which is crushed by the combine harvester.

Birch brooms were still used in racing stables in France in the 1980s and were very efficient, they cleaned the yard as much with the wind they created as with the birch twigs themselves. A carriage house with its original carriages can also be seen. the whole provides a very impressive historically correct exhibition of exactly how yards were stocked and managed for the aristocracy or wealthy.