Aranjuez Jardin

The valley where the Rivers Tagus and Jarama meet was a popular resort for rulers of Madrid. A palace was built here in the 1380s. Felipe II (Philip II) employed Dutchmen to make an Italian Renaissance garden in the 1560s. His French wife asked her Italian mother, Catherine de Medici, to send a gardener from Paris. In 1660 Philip IV began a complete transformation of the gardens and Philip V added to his work, making the Baroque garden we see today. French critics, belittling the design as a poor imitation of Le Nôtre, may have ignored the geographical differences between the two countries.