Boulbon, Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur, Address available on request

A singular country residence awaiting renovation, with a view of the Montagnette hills, Boulbon village and its windmill. The 'Mas Boun Aou' (good people's farmhouse) was originally a tenant farm, transformed in the 20th century into a country residence and later into an artist's house. A painter lived and worked here until the end of the last century, spending much of his time contemplating the surrounding countryside. Thereafter, many artists stayed here, escaping the frenzy of the world. Boun Aou bears the imprint of these successive stays, all of which had one thing in common: the search for seclusion. 
On the garden side, the elegant facade, built of opus incertum with rough-cut stones bonded with white mortar, bears the date 1875. 
Facing south/south-east, it features tall windows and large glass doors, highly unusual in Provence architecture, which generally favours small openings to provide better protection from the heat. 
Carved ornaments with mascaron, cornucopia and antique head motifs above the door frames probably bear witness to the time when a local dignitary lived here, as if to underline the nobility of this farmhouse of rural origin. A sundial adorns the corner of the south-east wall. A vast, empty hayloft adjoining the main building has a carriage door opening onto the countryside, providing further evidence of the building's rural past. 
The interior of the farmhouse is very rustic, with Ardèche chestnut beams showing branding marks from being floated down the Rhône, preserving the quaint atmosphere of the country homes of yesteryear. The interior masonry walls, often exposed, of the same type of 'cyclopean' massive stonework as on the outside, feature recesses designed to house votive statuettes. 
All the windows and doors open onto a garden of biblical species: pomegranate, olive, cypress, fig and myrtle trees. The discreetly shaped openings in the foliage offer views of the poetic Montagnette landscape, south of the Alpilles hills.