The guide · Walk 5 of 5 · moderate

The west shore, back to town

Two hotels, a botanist's garden, and a comic singer's face on a gatepost.

9gates

2.5 kmstraight-line between gates – the road is a little longer

47 minat 4.5 km/h, a minute and a half at each gate

Boulevard J.F. Kennedystart

Cap d’Antibes · VERA’s own boundary9 stops · dots: the other walks

1
Start · Boulevard J.F. Kennedy · built 1870
Villa Soleil, later the Grand Hôtel du Capopenparcel confirmed
Boulevard J.F. Kennedy · Hotel — grounds private
Conceived as a rest home for sick writers and opened as a hotel in 1870. It failed twice at auction — guided at 300,000 francs in 1877, no bidders, sold for 200,000 — before Antoine Sella made it what it is.
What the record saysIts first owner bought the ground at twenty-five centimes the square metre in 1863 and died of tuberculosis at thirty-five. The seawater pool at the point was thought an extravagance when it was cut.
Directions Photograph the gate
2
+217 m · 217 m in · built 1863
Villa Sainte-Anneparcel confirmed
Boulevard J.F. Kennedy · Private
Directly opposite the hotel gates. Begun in 1863 as a working rural holding by a liquor merchant; refaced in the Italian Renaissance manner in 1901 by Agnes McLaren.
What the record saysThe woman who gave it its present face was a doctor — one of the first British women to qualify in medicine — and she is buried in Antibes.
Directions Photograph the gate
3
+182 m · 399 m in · built 1903
Villa L'Olivetteparcel confirmed
Boulevard Maréchal Juin · Private — the busts are on the street
Two sculpted busts of a laughing man in a bowler hat, one on each gatepost, above a plate reading L'OLIVETTE. They are the comic singer Dranem's own face. The house behind is not his — but every owner since has kept the busts.
What the record saysThe widow of the man on the gateposts kept the house until 1948, when she lost it at poker. It was valued at 1.2 million francs; the winner ran a correspondence school across the French colonies.
Directions Photograph the gate
4
+121 m · 520 m in · built 1882
La Cigaronneparcel confirmed
Traverse des Nielles · Private
Two houses were built on this ground and later sold apart — the locals called them the two Jeannettes. This is the elder.
What the record saysA captain gave two plots to his son in 1814. Sixty-eight years later a Paris theatre director bought them and built here; a Belgian countess extended it and then split the pair.
Directions Photograph the gate
5
+221 m · 740 m in · built 1866
Villa les Chênes Vertsparcel confirmed
Boulevard J.F. Kennedy · Private
Three storeys under a roof terrace, a portico of Doric columns and a monumental staircase, built in 1866 for the first winter resident of the Cap. The grounds once held a carousel. It still circulates under a wrong name.
What the record saysSix changes of hand between 1866 and the present, each one dated. It also circulates under a name that has nothing to do with it, and that wrong name resolves correctly to this house.
Directions Photograph the gate
6
+105 m · 845 m in · built 1908
Grand Vatelparcel confirmed
Boulevard J.F. Kennedy · Residences
A plain block, and the strangest history on the walk. A farmer built it in 1908 and let it by the floor; an exiled Russian prince took the whole building and ran it as a hotel; it has been flats since 1945.
What the record saysThe building never changed hands while everything about it changed. One family owned it from 1908 to 1945 while it went from café to guesthouse to hotel to apartments.
Directions Photograph the gate
7
+500 m · 1.3 km in · built 1880s
Villa Rose-Marieparcel confirmed
Boulevard Francis Meilland · Private
Built by a woman who had inherited the villa opposite, sold it, and put this one up facing it. She died at 46 and it was auctioned for 25,000 francs — a sixth of what the other house fetched.
What the record saysHer inheritance was divided four ways between her parents, a sister who was a tenant, a brother who was a carpenter, and four nephews and nieces.
Directions Photograph the gate
8
+504 m · 1.8 km in · built 1911
Le Castel des Niellesparcel confirmed
Chemin des Nielles · Private — the turret carries over the wall
Look over the wall for an octagonal turret: a conical tiled roof, a carved stone pineapple on top, and a band of green and cream chequerboard tiles under the eaves. Four more villas were built on this one's garden in the 1920s.
What the record saysA Parisian widow put down a deposit of 28,000 francs on this ground in 1926 and never paid the rest. Her assets were seized within two years, with some of the new villas still unfinished.
Directions Photograph the gate
9
+656 m · 2.5 km in · built 1858–1861
Villa Thuretopenparcel confirmed
Boulevard du Cap · Public botanical garden — open
You can go in. A botanist began this house on 4 May 1858 and finished it for 15,049 francs. The plants came from as far as Oceania. It has been a public garden since 1878.
What the record saysGeorge Sand called the garden the most beautiful she had ever seen. It has not been a private house since 1878 and will never appear in a sale register.
Directions Photograph the gate