Chambord CastleChâteau de Chambord

Begun in 1519 for Francis I, Château de Chambord was less a residence than a monumental statement: a Renaissance palace disguised as a medieval fortress, set in a vast former hunting park. Its plan turns on the famed double-helix staircase, long associated with Leonardo da Vinci, and the roofline erupts into a city of chimneys and a lantern tower that reads like stone heraldry. For the Loire Valley it has become an emblem of royal ambition, where architecture performs power in the open landscape.