Treasure Island

Surprising as it may seem, the small and very delightful Provençal town of L’Isle-sur-la-Sorgue is considered the third most important antiques and bric-a-brac market in Europe, outdone only by Paris and London. Located 25 kilometers (15 miles) east of Avignon, the “island” on the river Sorgue is not really an island at all, but laced through by the transparent river’s branches and several canals. Quite often the whole town literally sparkles, with the strong Provençal sunlight filtering down through the plane trees and glinting off the limpid waterways.

Seven ancient, moss-covered waterwheels, scattered here and there, provide the proper atmosphere for L’Isle’s famous antique and brocante dealers—some 350 of them. Many of the shops are clustered into eleven “villages”, grouped together in vast, barn-like buildings or surrounding central courtyards, with anywhere from four or five to 30 shops each. The rest are strung out along the circular boulevard that rings L’Isle’s historic center. Most of the shops are open only on Friday-to-Sunday weekends and holidays, some add Thursdays and/or Mondays as well, and a few are open all week long.

On Sundays, the scene gets really hectic, with the weekly outdoor market strung throughout most of the streets in town—a traditional Provençal cornucopia of fruits and vegetables, sausages and cheese, flowers, clothes, shoes, colorful linens, ceramics, household goods and lots of lavender. Plus, of course, a nomadic band of flea market stands along the ring road and the riverside Gaultier Park. The Sunday brocante fun starts at around 8 am and ends about 6 pm—it’s best go early or late, and allow time to hunt hopelessly for a place in one of the outlying parking lots.

Twice a year, on Easter weekend and the weekend closest to August 15, there is the biggest bonanza of all, the Grand Déballage—the Great Unpacking, officially the Foire à la Brocante Antiquités—when some 500 additional antique and brocante dealers from all over the country and farther afield in Europe descend on L’Isle, which really must be seen to be believed—furniture, porcelain and crockery, clocks and canes, silverware and seltzer bottles—if you’re looking for something, anything at all, you’re likely to find it at the Grand Déballage. Technically, the first day of the weekend-long extravaganza is for professionals, but anyone with a business card can usually get into the game. And the Saturday and Sunday are a free-for-all.

L’Isle’s affinity with antiques began in 1890, when Joseph Légier set up shop as the first antique dealer in town. His son Raymond followed him into the trade and moved to Paris, but returned home after the financial crash of 1929. Third-generation René Légier, after seeing an antiques exhibit at the Palais des Papes in Avignon, got together with his friend Albert Gassier and founded L’Isle’s first antiques fair on August 15, 1966—14 dealers joined up, and thanks to a chance radio broadcast about the event, many more visitors than expected turned up. It was, in fact, not only the first antiques fair in town, but the first in France outside of Paris. After that, the antiques movement just kept growing, and so did L’Isle, from a population of some 7,000 in 1966 to more than 20,000 today. And until she retired recently, Nathalie Légier, founder Joseph’s great-granddaughter, maintained the family tradition with her antiques shop on the Avenue des Quatre Otages.

A tour of the villages could start at the Quai de la Gare, a former private home on Avenue Julien Guigue, adjacent to the railroad station, with some 30 dealers now ensconced on two floors. Jean-Pierre Thomasset specializes in 18th-century furniture and 19th- and early 20th-century paintings. A few steps away at Atelier D.L., Didier Luttenbacher and Eric Gasquet offer 19th-century furnishings and exceptional objects in gilded bronze, including a superb 12-piece gilded desk set with a naval motif, made for a 19th-century Marseille shipbuilder. In their gallery Antiquités de Castille, Jean and Françoise Dorlhac de Borne deal in fine 17th- and 18th-century furniture. Upstairs, Patrick Cordes offers an eclectic range of furniture, paintings and objets d’art from the 16th to the 19th century, such as a rare 16th-century walnut table with an oak top and a massive, ornate German wardrobe with gilded copper decoration, dated 1639. Elsewhere, there are rare books, ceramics and tribal arts.

Close by but a little hard to find is La Boutique de Francine, a well-stocked cache of antique fabrics, elegant household linens and traditional Provençal costumes.

Also close to the station is the Village des Antiquaires de la Gare, the oldest of L’Isle’s antiques villages, now including some 100 dealers whose specialties range from Aérogare’s aeronautic bric-a-brac and other collectibles to Luc Bonnefond’s leather furniture; provincial furnishings and folk arts Chez P’tit Louis; Ginette Hermet’s crystal and silverware; Brigitte Lagarde’s vintage linens; and, in other shops, porcelain and pottery, bistro furnishings, Oriental rugs and garden furniture.

Turn the corner into the Avenue de la Libération-one of the several avenues that comprise the ring around town- and you’ll find a lineup of individual antiques, brocante and decorating shops that are open all week long: Côté Parc, an irresistible jumble of furniture, lamps, ceramics, clocks, birdcages, dishes, glassware and bibelots of all sorts, runs straight through to a branch of the river out back; Actua too is a cluttered collection of covetable stuff—cabinets, tables, tin boxes, old shop signs, ash trays and bistro equipment including a few full-sized zinc-topped bars complete with barstools. Le Vieux Manoir is a family-run antiques shop also open most of the week, with fine furniture, brocante and decorative objects. Les Bains d’Aphrodite is a Swiss-owned shop filled with sumptuous bath furnishings that are not antiques at all but reproductions of antique models or just marble-topped, polished-wood, brass-fitted dreams of luxury baths that never were.

Farther around the ring road, as it becomes the Avenue des Quatre Otages, Xavier Nicod is a second-generation dealer whose shop now runs straight through to a jungle-like garden opening onto the courtyard of the Carré de l’Isle “village”.  A favorite with chic Parisian decorators, Nicod’s shop is eclectic, eccentric and decidedly funky—a bizarre Ali Baba’s cavern with slender trees growing straight up through the center and a rusted propeller plane suspended from the ceiling. Those in the know say you can find exactly the right, artfully unrestored thing at Nicod, if you know how to look.

At the end of the avenue and just around the corner, opposite Les Boutiques de l’Orée de l’Isle, is the big garden shop of Jean-Marc Jannin, another good source for the odd and exceptional, with a collection of 18th-, 19th- and 20th-century furniture and decorative objects.

Antique hunting shouldn’t exclude a stroll along the riverside quays that marked the birth of the city. L’Isle first emerged from the marshes of the Sorgue in the 12th century, built on pillars implanted in the riverbed, much like Venice. It was a town of fishermen who plied the cool, clear waters of the Sorgue, and of millers and weavers whose millwheels were powered by the river’s force.

After the Popes fled Rome in 1309 and settled in nearby Avignon, L’Isle became part of the papal territory called the Comtat Venaissin (named after its first capital, nearby Venasque). Through the vagaries of history, and except for brief periods under Louis XIV and Louis XV, the Comtat, and L’Isle, remained papal property until after the Revolution, finally reverting to France in 1797.

All that’s left of this early history is the 11th-century Tour Boutin, or Tour d’Argent, in the center of the old town, facing the church of Notre Dame des Anges, a 13th-century basilica greatly enlarged and richly decorated in Italian Baroque fashion in the 17th century. The fishermen are long gone too, although their traditional narrow, extremely flat boats, curiously called “négo-chins” are still used for pleasure, and it’s not unusual to see kids paddling them down the river and then diving to lie flat as the boat skims beneath the low pedestrian bridges.

Today the quays are lined with sidewalk cafés, perfect for a pause while wandering through the maze of narrow streets and alleys in the center with their evocative names—rue le la Loutre (otter), rue de l’Anguille (eel), rue des Ecrivisses (crawfish). In the Hôtel Campredon, an 18th-century private mansion, there’s a small museum dedicated to the poet René Char, the city’s native son.

No visitor to L’Isle-sur-la-Sorgue should miss Fontaine-de-Vaucluse, just a few kilometers away, a town named after the source of the Sorgue river and one of the most powerful resurgent springs in the world. The mysterious Vaucluse “fountain” is hidden in a rocky grotto overgrown with lush vegetation, a milky emerald pool whose depth is still unknown. Joined by other underground springs, its waters rush out in a foamy tumult over the rocks, spinning the old mill wheels that still ornament the town quays. Sometimes, in spring and fall, the surging river even submerges the trees along its banks.

This was the vallis clausa—the closed valley—that gave its name to the Monts de Vaucluse. The Italian poet Petrarch, in love with his unattainable—and still unidentified— Laura, spent 16 years in a small house near the river. “Here with me,” he wrote, “in this faraway spot, back from their exile, live the Muses.”

The muses would have a hard time competing with the tourists today, but to catch a glimpse of their handiwork, cross the bridge to the left bank where, in a quiet, rarely-visited riverside garden, a tiny museum-library displays an array of Petrarch memorabilia, including a dozen portraits of women who might possibly have been the poet’s beloved Laura. One of them—considered the prime candidate—is Laure de Noves, wife of Hugues de Sade, an ancestor of the famous sadist Marquis.

Not many tourists venture into the village’s 11th-century church, either, a dark Romanesque cavern dedicated to Saint Véran, the 6th-century bishop of Cavaillon, who is credited with conquering the Couloubre of the Vaucluse—an amphibious dragon of nasty repute. In a variant of this tall tale, some say that it was Petrarch himself who smote the mighty reptile, when it dared to emerge from the river to menace his lovely Laura.

 

L’ISLE-SUR-LA-SORGUE NOTEBOOK

RESTAURANTS

Le Jardin du Quai Chef Daniel Hébet won a Michelin star at Le Mirande in Avignon before moving to this irresistible garden restaurant where he serves the best meals in town. It’s a fixed price and a fixed menu with no choices, but delicious. Reservations essential. Lunch €30 (Sunday €35), dinner €40. 91 ave Julien Guigue, 04.90.20.14.98.

Le Carré d’Herbes In the courtyard of the Carré de l’Isle village, a small and very pleasant restaurant. 13 ave des Quatre Otages, 04.90.38.23.97.

GALLERIES

Quai de la Gare 4 ave Julien Guigue, 04.90.20.73.42
Jean-Pierre Thomasset 04.66.67.68.87
Atelier D.L. 06.14.31.24.73
Antiquités de Castille 06.09.38.22.15
Patrick Cordes 04.90.71.67.41

La Boutique de Francine 1 ave Julien Guigue, 04.90.38.55.81

Village des Antiquaires de la Gare 2 bis ave de l’Egalité, 04.90.38.04.57
Aérogare 06.68.60.70.03
Luc Bonnefond 06.80.18.05.74
Chez P’tit Louis 06.23.63.84.68
Ginette Hermet 06.83.36.72.64
Brigitte Lagarde 06.08.28.19.30

Côté Parc 129 ave de la Libération, 04.90.21.58.62

Actua 176 ave de la Libération, 04.90.38.60.74

Le Vieux Manoir 41 ave de la Libération, 06.09.52.00.57

Les Bains d’Aphrodite 25 ave de la Libération, 04.90.20.74.24

Xavier Nicod 9 ave des Quatre Otages, 04.90.38.07.20

Carré de l’Isle 13 ave des Quatre Otages

Les Boutiques de l’Orée de l’Isle Place de l’Orée de l’Isle Jean-Marc Jannin 06.80.62.16.06

 

Originally published in the September 2008 issue of France Today; updated in May 2010.