Château Dreaming

Wallonia (Belgium) · Liège, Belgium

Château de Modave

Perched sixty metres above the Hoyoux on a limestone cliff, rebuilt in the grand 17th-century manner with celebrated Hansche stuccoes. Here in 1668 the carpenter Rennequin Sualem built a water-raising wheel to feed the château — the direct prototype of the gigantic Machine de Marly that would water Versailles.

Château de Modave
Photo: JackyM59 · CC BY-SA 4.0 (via Wikimedia Commons)

At a glance

Built
Rebuilt 1650s–1670s
Style
17th-century château on a cliff
Commissioned by
Jean-Gaspard-Ferdinand, Count of Marchin
Signature feature
Cliff-edge site 60 m above the Hoyoux valley
Engineering first
Sualem's 1668 water machine — prototype of the Machine de Marly
Interiors
Jean-Christian Hansche's virtuoso stucco ceilings
Ownership
Vivaqua (Brussels water company) — the springs still matter
Visiting
Open to visitors (seasonal calendar)