Giverny Embroidered Silk Dupioni - Green

GIVERNY COLLECTION

Claude Monet discovered Giverny, a village of about 300 people, mostly farmers, while looking out of a train window in 1883.  His letters tell of his increasing attachment to the village he would eventually move to and live in until his death. 

It wasn't until 1890 that Monet became the owner of the house and gardens and transformed them to match his vision.  The Clos Normand lies in front of the house, full of flowers (100,000 plants replaced each year and 100,000 perennials.)   His beloved waterlily pond, the painted versions of which would later grace museums walls the world over, was dug on the other side of the road.  To accomplish it, he, without hesitation, diverted a branch of the Epte River. 

Giverny became an artist hotbed in 1887, when a colony of artists, mostly American, moved to this little known French hideaway.  They were most likely motivated by the charm of the place rather than Monet's presence (which they did not know of at the time).  About a hundred artists stayed there over the course of thirty years, unencouraged by Monet who found their presence there a nuisance.  Their art, however, would be deeply influenced by Monet's impressionist techniques.

When Monet died in December of 1926, he was buried in the family vault near the village church, ever near the gardens and ponds that gave him life.