The prettiest places to visit in Provence

How to chart Provence on a map? It is hard to comprehend and prone to fuzzy theories about which mountains hem it in, which topography traces its rims. French regional maps will be no help. To the south, Provence flows clearly into the Mediterranean, but head north, through the Drôme region, and the uncertainty begins.

Provence is seeking to unify the lands on which its spirit thrives: Italy, Spain and the Meditarranean. It flows everywhere: in the splice of a knife slicing a lemon, the velvet wings of an eagle, the cries of fun and fright in Camargue’s manade bull ranches, the sweep of a corniche cliff road and the babble of a daube provençal stew. This is where the Provence landscape is epitomised. Every inch of it is associated with food and eating. But meals don’t go down here as they do in Paris and Naples. There is gusto here; voracity. Eating is a language in itself.

We might end up storing this Provence away in the attic of an old-world France, with ornamental figures, the mistral and lots of lavender. Yet, it’s in the mauve hills of Valensole that Simon Porte Jacquemus trumpeted modernity, bringing his models for a fashion show
to mark the 10th anniversary of his couture house ('Coup de soleil', June 2019). On an endless fuchsia carpet cutting a runway through the triumphant lavender, his creations found a perfect echo. Modernity needs authenticity to be validated. In this vein, you could view Provence as a moral checkpoint, implacable in its selection process. If it’s good, then it’s good: the sculptor César, the MuCEM museum in Marseille, Ora Ito at the Cité Radieuse, the architect Rudy Ricciotti. Or the Château La Coste winery estate near Aix-en-Provence, where works by Calder, Ando, Louise Bourgeois, Frank O Gehry, Hiroshi Sugimoto and Richard Serra embellish the rolling countryside.

These are some of the prettiest places to visit in Provence.