Versailles enhanced by virtual reality: "Versailles: Lost Gardens of the Sun King"

This March, GEDEON Experiences, Small Creative, VIVE Arts and the Château de Versailles will unveil at the Château de Versailles an unparalleded virtual reality (VR) experience. Versailles: Lost Gardens of the Sun King will allow visitors to explore 17th Century iconic, lost spaces of the gardens of Versailles and gain a deeper understanding of how Louis XIV intended to use the arts, architecture, and nature to affirm his power and the splendor of his reign.

An unprecedented experience at the château

An unprecedented immersive experience at the Château de Versailles opens this March, reviving for the first time legendary vanished spaces of Versailles’s 17th Century gardens. Versailles: Lost Gardens of the Sun King offers a collective and interactive virtual reality (VR) location-based experience (LBE) of vanished sites and allows visitors to engage closely with this rather under-explored aspect of French royal History and Louis XIV’s legacy at Versailles.

The landmark experience is co-produced by GEDEON Experiences, Small Creative, VIVE Arts and the Château de Versailles and is open at the Château from March 25th through January 4, 2026.

Developed through the meticulous mining of archival documents, testimonies from experts of the Château de Versailles, and archeological remains, and brought to life with cutting-edge technology and HTC’s VIVE Focus Vision mobile headsets, this immersive LBE transports users to the first gardens of the Château de Versailles when the Palace became the court’s main residence. Through the scientific and artistic reconstruction developed by Aristeas, a subsidiary of the GEDEON group, of three legendary sites - the Royal Menagerie, the Labyrinth Grove, and the Grotto of Tethys - visitors can investigate the role these spaces played in shaping the Sun King’s historical legacy.

Guided by Louis XIV’s landscape artist André Le Nôtre, this multi-user experience lets visitors freely explore a Versailles where the shaping of nature and entertainment served royal power and splendor. Interactive features enhance self-guided discovery, immersing users in the grandeur and ambition of Louis XIV, while deepening their understanding of the subtle relationship between art, architecture, and royal power.

Agnès Garaudel, General Manager - Producer at GEDEON Experiences said “Today, our aim is to use virtual reality to take visitors on a journey back in time, to share with them the moments of history that enhance our heritage. It’s a new way of transmitting knowledge, as much through the story we tell as through the emotion we arouse in the public. It’s fascinating to imagine how the evolution of technology will enable us, in the future, to go even further in our modes of storytelling.”

Celina Yeh, Executive Director of VIVE Arts, said, “This landmark project builds on VIVE Arts’ many years of partnering with leading cultural institutions around the globe to create innovative immersive projects that expand the ways culture can be experienced. This collaboration with the Château de Versailles is a testament to the transformative possibilities of VR. Through the power of immersive tech, we can bring to life previously inaccessible culture and history for contemporary audiences.”

“Scientific innovation has always been part of the history of Versailles, from the most precise clocks to the first hot air balloons flights”, said Christophe Leribault, President of the Château de Versailles. “Now, the introduction of virtual reality not only seamlessly continues this legacy but it also allows us to explore a part of Versailles that was thought to be lost forever.”

Vincent Guttmann, Co-Founder and CEO of Small Creative, said : “It is fascinating to see how a lived, shared experience marks minds and memories more easily and durably than passive information. At Small Creative, we do not just tell stories, we bring them to life. We aim to make technology invisible behind compelling storytelling and authentic emotions, making the experience feel natural. Sharing these experiences with family or friends makes them even more memorable, as people continue to discuss long after they have left the venue, reflecting on what they have just experienced together.”

information and ticketing

Versailles: Lost Gardens of the Sun King
From 25 March till January 4, 2026, Château de Versailles
- Co-produced by GEDEON Experiences, Small Creatives, VIVE Arts and the Château de Versailles with the support of CNC.
- A 25 minutes virtual reality experience
Available in French, English and Chinese
Recommended for ages 8 and up
- Tickets: 15 euros
- Bundle ticket with Palace ticket: 35 euros
- Bundle ticket with Passport ticket (Palace, Trianon, Musical Fountain Show): 45 euros
Information and ticketing: en.chateauversailles.fr

partners

GEDEON Experiences

As creators of multi-format narratives, we explore immersive technologies to deliver spectacular cultural experiences.

GEDEON Experiences is the innovative branch of GEDEON Media Group, which has been a major figure in documentary production in France and abroad for the past twenty-five years.

We design and produce multi-format immersive experiences based on the strengths that have made our success: the grasp of the codes of storytelling and image, the access to exclusive subjects and the ability to lead large-scale international projects.

As experts in 3D reconstructions of lost environments, always as close as possible to historical and scientific reality, we are particularly committed to raising public awareness about culture, history, great discoveries, the arts, the environment and science.

We have been developing our expertise in the original creation of immersive and interactive environments through the production of innovative XR experiences and large-format exhibitions, in collaboration with major cultural institutions.

For example, we developed the “Pompeii” exhibition at the Grand Palais (2020), co-produced with the RMN and the Pompeii Archaeological Park, the VR experience “GAUDI, the Atelier of the Divine” coproduced with Small Creative and NHK in partnership with Sagrada Familia, and our last success was in 2024 at Musée d’Orsay with “Tonight with the Impressionists, Paris 1874” in coproduction with Excurio and Musée d’Orsay welcoming more than 80,000 people in 4 months.

We are constantly looking for new forms of storytelling and creation to offer ever more astonishing and innovative sensory experiences, in the service of emotion and knowledge. We are pushing back the frontiers of technology to enable all audiences to discover, understand and dream.

Press Contact GEDEON Experiences
Agnès Garaudel
+33 (0)6 14 60 14 81

Small Creative

Small Creative blends technology and culture to create immersive experiences for families and friends.

As both a studio and production company, Small Creative develops and produces a catalog of collective and free-roaming VR experiences specifically designed for the location-based market.

With a team of forty professionals, we provide comprehensive artistic, technological and financial engineering services. Our experts create ambitious content using tools and technologies they have mastered over many years.

In the past year, we have conceived and produced award-winning virtual reality experiences including “Gaudi, l’Atelier du Divin” (co-produced with Gédéon Expériences) and “Titanic: Echoes of the Past” (co-produced with Eclipso). These experiences are distributed and operated worldwide through our “OnSite” solution.

Small Creative is a member of French Immersive Studios.

Presse Contact Small Creative
Vincent Guttmann
vincent@small-creative.io

VIVE Arts

VIVE Arts harnesses cutting-edge technology to transform the way culture is made, shared and experienced. Over the past seven years, VIVE Arts has pioneered the use of immersive technologies in the arts and culture sector, inspiring boundary-pushing artists, creators and leading international institutions to use VR, AR, XR, AI and blockchain for the first time, creating groundbreaking digital artworks and experiences. A leader in the art and technology space, VIVE Arts develops digital innovation projects which preserve the world’s heritage and culture, offering new ways to engage and extend access to wider audiences.