FILM SUMMARY

Profile of the great horseman and riding-master, Yves Bienaimé, a man dedicated to his passion for horse-ridding and to a temple devoted to the horse, the very famous Great Stables of Chantilly (France, at the north of Paris), where he has created the Musée Vivant du Cheval (Living Horse Museum) a real institution of international renown.

HISTORY of the Great Stables of Chantilly (France)

In 1719, Louis-Henri de Bourbon, the 7th Prince de Condé, commissioned the architect Jean Aubert to design and build stables befitting his rank. Legend has it that the Prince believed in metempsychosis and throught he would be reincarnated as an horse after his death.
The stables, at the north of Paris (40 km), considered to be the most beautiful in the world, are the masterpieceof 18 th-century architecture and are 186 meters long.

In 18th century, they housed 240 horses and up to 500 hounds. The Grandes Ecuries were also the setting for many lavish celebrations and official visits. : Louis XV, the Emperor of Austria, Joseph II, and the furure futur Tsar Paul 1er of Russia...all dined there.

In 1830, the Duc de Bourbon bequeathed his Chantilly estate to his nephew, the Duc d'Aumale, the fourth son of king Louis-Philippe. In 1886, the childless Henri d'Orléans left it to the Institut de France, stipulating that it be preserved as it was. This fabulous inheritance comprised the Château, the Grandes Ecuries, the racecourse and close to 8,000 hectares of forest! Visiting this exceptional site, President Nixon is said to have asked : "Why have I been taken to Versailles seven times and never once here ?

In 1982, Yves Bienaimé, riding-master, founded a living and teaching museum in the Grandes Ecuries : Le Musée Vivant du Cheval (Living Horse Museum).

The Living Horse Museum

Yves et Annabel Bienaimé inaugurated the Musée Vivant du Cheval on 6 june 1982.
In 24 years, the museum has become a real institution of international renown for every horseman and every Art and Culture enthusiast and it is today acknowledged to be the most beautiful and largest of its type.
31 rooms covering 4,000 sqare meters of floor space and 800 meters of track. It attracts some 200,000 visitors annually.

Its succes is due to its living and educational nature.
The only way to truly know horses is to observe then and the way in which they live. Horses of various breeds are present found right from the entrance of the museum.
Throughout the day, the horses perform their daily tasks : riding demonstrations are given three times a day with the riders in museums costumes.

Since 2002, Yves Bienaimé has created a new institution : the Princes' Kitchen Garden in Chantilly. This beautifull vegetables and flowers garden was the proprety of the Prince of Condé who ask André Le Nôtre to draw it with the same spririt as the Royal Kitchen Garden in Versailles.