Discover Juan-les-Pins
“I remember finding myself one day before Antibes, as if grabbed by a beam of light, exclaiming that it was too much, that it was too beautiful!” –Jacques Audiberti
A little history
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Antibes Juan-les-Pins was once called Antipolis, “the city in front.”
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In the 19th century, the city starts developing from within and begins the demolition of its ramparts.
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The seaside station of Juan-les-Pins is created in 1882. The city does not stop growing after the First World War but remains les urbanized than other parts of the coastline. This is perhaps what gives the city its charm today.
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A city very loved by artists: Prévert, Audiberti, Greene, Picasso and Monet find in the old stones of the château, the ramparts, and the streets a new source of inspiration.
Juan-les-Pins: An American passion
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The station opens thanks to immigrants of a liberated America. In the middle of the pine forests shared by a few discreet villas, Frank-Jay Gould, heir of the tycoon of the American railroads, begins the first large fashionable summer coastline resort town. Working with the French Edouard Baudoin, one of the Deauville promoters, he purchases the old seaside casino and transforms it into one of the most beautiful and active on the coast.
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The intellectual elite and international society meet here: Scott Fitzgerald, Charlie Chaplin, Marlène Dietrich, John Dos Passos, Picasso etc.
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The Cap d’Antibes and Juan will inspire Francis Scott Fitzgerald’s most famous novels, “Tender is the Night “ et “Tales of the Jazz Age “.
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May 1927: Frank-Jay Gould opens “The Provençal,” the first large palace of the coast, which becomes with the casino the “engine” of Juan-les-Pins.
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Juan-les-Pins therefore becomes a trendy resort town and will not cease, over the years and seasons, to shine among the most celebrated and trendy seaside resort towns of Europe
“I am stunned by this kind of stupor in which the grandness of things throws us, by wandering a garden admirably situated at the gate of Antibes. We are in an Eden that seems to swim within immenseness.” (George Sand)
Calendar and cultural events:
- International Bridge Festival
- 53rd Antibes Rally Côte d’Azur
- 58th Jazz at Juan
- To learn more: website of the Antibes-Juan-Les-Pins City Hall.
Juan-les-Pins, a city with many faces
Go further:
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Read the article, “The Americans reinvent Juan-les-Pins” (Le Figaro, August 2016)
- Read the article, “Scott Fitzgerald on the Beautiful Banks of Juan-les-Pins” (Le Figaro, March 2008)
- Read “Juan-les-Pins, la péninsule des Arts” (L’Internaute, “Escapade”)
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Watch the documentary “Hôtel Provençal” dedicated to the mythical palace of Juan-les-Pins
- Wikipedia page on Juan-les-Pins
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