{{Short description|Detached villa in France}} {{about|the villa|other uses|Pausa}} {{Good article}} {{Use dmy dates|date=January 2025}} '''La Pausa''' is a large detached villa in Roquebrune-Cap-Martin, in the Alpes-Maritimes department of France. It was designed and built by the French fashion designer Coco Chanel in the early 1930s,<ref name="CCPic">{{harvnb|Picardie|2010|pp=165}}</ref> and owned by Chanel until 1953. La Pausa was sold by Chanel to the Hungarian publisher Emery Reves. The former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill spent roughly a third of each year at La Pausa from 1956 to 1958 with Reves and his wife, Wendy, and wrote and edited part of his ''History of the English Speaking Peoples'' there. La Pausa was occupied by Wendy Reves until 2007. The principal rooms of La Pausa and its significant art collection were recreated at the Dallas Museum of Art during her lifetime and under her direction. The Reves wing was opened in 1985.<ref>The Wendy and Emery Reves collection, Dallas Museum of Art, Dallas, 1985.</ref>
Situated above the village of Roquebrune, the house enjoys views toward Menton and the French border with Italy on one side, and Monaco on the other.<ref name="ChInt">{{harvnb|Chaney|2011|pp=178}}</ref> Its name refers to the legend that Mary Magdalene "paused" near here on her journey from Jerusalem following the crucifixion of Jesus.<ref name="ChInt"/><ref name="NYTParis">{{cite news|last=Elaine|first=Sciolino|title=Letter from Paris: The House that Coco Built|work=The New York Times|date=7 June 2013|url=http://tmagazine.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/06/07/letter-from-paris-the-house-that-coco-built/?_r=0}}</ref>
==Coco Chanel== Chanel bought the five-acre plot on which La Pausa was built for 1.8 million French francs in February 1929. The plot had formerly been part of the hunting grounds of the ruling family of Monaco, the Grimaldis, and contained wild olive and orange groves.<ref name="CCCos">{{harvnb|Cosgrave|2013|pp=109}}</ref> The villa was built less than a year later.<ref name="CCPic"/> The final cost of the villa was 6 million francs, a large sum for the time.<ref name="Chaney2011">{{cite book|author=Lisa Chaney|title=Chanel: An Intimate Life|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=oG280bBfpNYC&pg=PT345|date=6 October 2011|publisher=Penguin Books Limited|isbn=978-0-14-197299-2|page=345}}</ref> It is not clear whether Chanel or her lover, Hugh Grosvenor, 2nd Duke of Westminster financed the building and furnishing of La Pausa.<ref>{{harvnb|Chaney|2011|pp=303}}</ref> La Pausa was built by architect Robert Streitz, who sought to build 'the ideal Mediterranean villa'.<ref name="CCPic"/> thumb|Coco Chanel and the Duke of Westminster The design of the house modelled on the 12th-century convent-orphanage in Aubazines, in the department of Corrèze, which Chanel spent her childhood. A stone staircase leads up from the main entrance hall and a cloister encloses a courtyard.<ref name="NYTParis"/> A design of five windows is repeated throughout the house, in tribute to Chanel's perfume, Chanel No. 5.<ref name="NYTParis"/> Chanel bought more than 20,000 curved tiles from surrounding homes for the roof, and furnished the house sparsely in shades of white and beige. Each bathroom has a servants' entrance.<ref name="NYTParis"/> Chanel would take ''Le Train Bleu'' from Paris every month to inspect the progress of the building.<ref Name="CCCos110">{{harvnb|Cosgrave|2013|pp=110}}</ref> If Chanel was unable to make the trip, local craftsmen would be sent to Paris to meet her.<ref name="CCCos110"/>
The colour scheme of the house was beige, which included a beige piano.<ref name="CCCos110"/> Chanel may have been assisted in her design of the interior of La Pausa by Stéphane Boudin, the president of the interior design firm Maison Jansen.<ref name="CCCos110"/> thumb|The Great Hall of La Pausa as reconstructed at the Dallas Museum of Art The central villa is 10,000 sq ft (930 m<sup>2</sup>) in size, with two smaller villas built for guests.<ref name="NYTParis"/><ref name="Chaney2011"/> The main house consists of seven bedrooms, with three living rooms, a dining room, two kitchens, and staff quarters.<ref name="NYTParis"/> Streitz had previously restored another local villa for Chanel's friend, Count Jean de Segonzac.<ref name="Chaney2011"/>
La Pausa contains three wings that face onto a shaded courtyard, with the rooms containing large fireplaces.<ref name="Chaney2011"/> The rooms were filled by Chanel with 16th-century English oak furniture, given to her by the Duke of Westminster; English oak was also used for floors and panelling.<ref name="Chaney2011"/> The large reception rooms were lit by wrought-iron chandeliers from Spain.<ref name="CCCos114">{{harvnb|Cosgrave|2013|pp=114}}</ref>
The poet Pierre Reverdy stayed at La Pausa for long periods during the 1930s, and the poet Paul Iribe, Chanel's lover, collapsed and died while playing tennis with Chanel at La Pausa in 1935.<ref name="Chaney2011"/> Guests of Chanel's at La Pausa included Igor Stravinsky, Pablo Picasso, Salvador Dalí and Luchino Visconti.<ref name="NYTParis"/>
La Pausa was profiled by American ''Vogue'' magazine in 1938, with the garden described as containing "groves of orange trees, great slopes of lavender, masses of purple iris, and huge clusters of climbing roses."<ref name="NYTParis"/> Twenty olive trees from Antibes were replanted in the garden.<ref name="CCCos110"/> The designer Roderick Cameron said that at La Pausa, Chanel was the first to cultivate lavender and other flora previously regarded as "poor plants".<ref name="CCCos114"/>
The architect of La Pausa, Robert Streitz, was a member of the French Resistance during the German occupation of France in the Second World War.<ref name="CCPicA">{{harvnb|Picardie|2010|pp=237}}</ref> Streitz hid in La Pausa's cellars, from which he transmitted covert messages. Jewish refugees were also able to use La Pausa, using its gardens as a staging post in their escape from France to the Italian border.<ref name="CCPicA"/> During the German occupation of France, Chanel made several visits to La Pausa with her lover, the German spy Baron von Dincklage.<ref name="CCPicA"/>
The design of La Pausa also influenced Chanel's fashion designs, with her collections evoking the pink and grey palettes of the house and landscape.<ref>{{harvnb|Cosgrave|2013|pp=119}}</ref> In 2007 Chanel released a perfume inspired by La Pausa, 28 La Pausa, as part of their "Les Exclusifs" collection.<ref name="NYTParis"/> It was created by Chanel's perfumer Jacques Polge.<ref name="NYTParis"/>
==Emery and Wendy Reves== thumb|A box of paints used by Winston Churchill at La Pausa Chanel sold La Pausa in 1953 to the Hungarian émigré publisher Emery Reves.<ref name="NYTParis"/><ref name="Lovell2011">{{cite book|author=Mary Lovell|title=The Churchills|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=n5YlSoQqx9YC&pg=PT486|date=7 April 2011|publisher=Little, Brown Book Group|isbn=978-0-7481-1711-6|page=486}}</ref> Reves bought La Pausa from the proceeds of the foreign-language rights to the British Prime Minister Winston Churchill's book on the Second World War.<ref name="Schweber2009">{{cite book|author=Silvan S. Schweber|title=Einstein and Oppenheimer: The Meaning of Genius|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Mpgs6qqNERwC&pg=PA65|date=30 June 2009|publisher=Harvard University Press|isbn=978-0-674-04335-0|page=65}}</ref> Churchill subsequently became a guest of Reves and Reve's wife, Wendy Russell Reves, at La Pausa, often staying for weeks at a time.<ref name="Schweber2009"/> Churchill found the atmosphere with the Reveses at La Pausa relaxing, with his secretary describing him as seeming "twenty years younger" when at the house, which Churchill nicknamed "Pausaland".<ref name="Pearson2011">{{cite book|author=John Pearson|title=The Private Lives of Winston Churchill|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=LOyIFMhshAQC&pg=PT315|date=1 December 2011|publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing|isbn=978-1-4482-0783-1|page=315}}</ref> Guests hosted by the Reves with Churchill included Noël Coward, Somerset Maugham and Edward Molyneux.<ref name="Lovell2011"/> However, Churchill's wife, Clementine, found La Pausa claustrophobic, and only stayed with Churchill for four of his eleven visits to the house. Churchill would spend a total of 54 weeks at La Pausa over the three and a half years from his first visit in 1956, spending roughly a third of a year at the house from 1956 to 1958.<ref name="Jenkins2002">{{cite book|author=Roy Jenkins|title=Churchill|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=QQTYWavUky8C&pg=PA904|year=2002|publisher=Pan Books|isbn=978-0-330-48805-1|page=904}}</ref> While at the house Churchill wrote and edited part of his ''History of the English Speaking Peoples''.<ref name='Church'/> Churchill would occupy an entire floor when he stayed at La Pausa; his private secretary Anthony Montague Brown, had his own office, and Clementine Churchill had her own suite.<ref name='Church'>{{cite web|title=Emery and Wendy Reves "La Pausa" For Sale for $56 million|url=http://www.winstonchurchill.org/learn/in-the-media/churchill-in-the-news/1272-emery-and-wendy-reves-qla-pausaq-for-sale|work=WinstonChurchill.org – Churchill in the news|publisher=The Churchill Foundation|access-date=20 October 2013|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131022162925/http://www.winstonchurchill.org/learn/in-the-media/churchill-in-the-news/1272-emery-and-wendy-reves-qla-pausaq-for-sale|archive-date=22 October 2013}}</ref> Churchill's visits to La Pausa were curtailed in 1960 after Emery Reves declined to host him, apparently because of a perceived snub by Churchill and Wendy's mental health.<ref name="Jenkins2002"/>
Other notable high society guests hosted by the Reves at La Pausa included Prince Rainier and Princess Grace of Monaco, the Duke and Duchess of Windsor, and the actors Greta Garbo, Errol Flynn and Clark Gable.<ref name="Lovell2011"/>
===Art collection, Dallas Museum of Art=== Emery and Wendy Reves created an important collection of impressionist and post-impressionist art at La Pausa, with such artists as Paul Cézanne, Claude Monet, Paul Gauguin, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Vincent van Gogh and Edgar Degas represented in their collection of seventy paintings. In addition to paintings their collection at La Pausa included 300 pieces of Chinese export porcelain, more than 150 silver objects, Medieval ironwork and Arabic and Spanish carpets.<ref name="Bryant2001">{{cite book|author=Keith L. Bryant|title=Culture in the American Southwest: The Earth, the Sky, the People|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=yDz4djWiAgkC&pg=PA241|year=2001|publisher=Texas A&M University Press|isbn=978-0-89096-948-9|page=241}}</ref>
Following Emery Reves's death in 1981, the Dallas Museum of Art in the United States approached Wendy Reves knowing that there was a possibility that her art collection at La Pausa might be given to a museum.<ref name="Bryant2001"/> In exchange for the 1985 donation Reves insisted that the museum recreate six of the principal rooms at La Pausa, and display the collection there as she had arranged it.<ref name="Bryant2001"/> The collection of 1,400 objet d'art is displayed at the museum as the Wendy and Emery Reves Collection in a reconstruction of five rooms from La Pausa.<ref name='DMA'>{{cite web|title=Dallas Museum of Art Celebrates the 25th anniversary of the Wendy and Emery Reves Collection|url=https://www.dma.org/press-release/dallas-museum-art-celebrates-25th-anniversary-wendy-and-emery-reves-collection|work=Dallas Museum of Art – Press release|publisher=Dallas Museum of Art|access-date=5 November 2014}}</ref> The villa's central courtyard and patio were reconstructed at the museum along with the villa's dining room, library, salon, bedroom, and hall,<ref name='DMA'/> situated in a purpose-built 16,500-square-foot wing designed by architect Edward Larrabee Barnes.<ref name='DMA'/> Wendy Reves also donated $3 million to the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia, to establish the Reves Center for International Studies, and directed that the Reves Foundation benefit that college with 40 percent of annual endowment funding. She also arranged for herself and her husband to be buried at William and Mary.<ref name='Nancy Smith'>{{cite book|title=Churchill on the Riviera: Winston Churchill, Wendy Reves, and the Villa La Pausa built by Coco Chanel|publisher=Biblio Press}}</ref>
==21st century== Wendy Reves continued to occupy the house until her death in 2007.<ref name="NYTParis"/> She bequeathed the Reves Foundation including the villa and its contents to the Dallas Museum of Art (which received the largest part), as well as to several charities, and the College of Williams and Mary. La Pausa was closed up after her death;<ref name="NYTParis"/> in 2013 the house was described as requiring modernisation, needing new heating, electrical, and plumbing systems, as well as renovations to the kitchen and bathrooms.<ref name="NYTParis"/> Repairs were also required to the stone steps and road leading to the house.<ref name="NYTParis"/>
Following Reves's death, La Pausa was put up for sale, with the sale of items from the house to benefit the Reves Foundation.<ref name='Church'/> In 2012 La Pausa was withdrawn from sale by Sotheby's due to pending litigation.<ref name="NYTParis"/> After the legal problems were resolved, Knight Frank put La Pausa up for sale in May 2013 for 40 million euros.<ref name="NYTParis"/> In 2013 the French ambassador to Monaco, Hugues Moret, said of the sale that La Pausa was "part of France's heritage", adding that "We have to find a way to keep it in the family."<ref name="NYTParis"/>
The villa was bought by Chanel in 2015. Following a restoration by architect Peter Marino, La Pausa is now used as a creative retreat for artists and writers.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Davidson |first1=Annabel |title=Inside La Pausa: Coco Chanel's Côte d'Azur hideaway that inspired the new high jewellery collection |url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/luxury/jewellery/inside-la-pausa-coco-chanels-cote-dazur-hideaway-inspired-new/ |access-date=3 April 2019 |work=The Telegraph |date=22 July 2017}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last1=Weil |first1=Jennifer |title=Chanel Buys Founder's Villa La Pausa |url=https://wwd.com/fashion-news/fashion-scoops/chanel-buys-villa-la-pausa-france-10246892/ |access-date=3 April 2019 |work=WWD |date=30 September 2015}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=McGrath |first=Katherine |date=2025-06-19 |title=Coco Chanel's South of France Sanctuary Just Underwent a Meticulous Restoration. Here's a Guide to Its Key Motifs (And Easter Eggs) |url=https://www.culturedmag.com/article/2025/06/19/gabrielle-chanel-la-pausa-restoration-peter-marino/ |access-date=2025-07-05 |website=Cultured Mag |language=en-US}}</ref>
==Works from the Wendy and Emery Reves Collection== <gallery widths="140px" heights="140px" perrow="4"> File:Cezanne Still Life with Apples a Bottle and a Milk Pot.jpg|Paul Cézanne, ''Still Life with Apples, a Bottle and a Milk Pot'', 1900–06 File:Cezanne Still Life with Carafe Milk Can Bowl and Orange DMA.jpg|Paul Cézanne, ''Still Life with Carafe, Milk Can, Bowl, and Orange'', 1879–80 File:Gustave Courbet - Portrait of Jongkind.jpg|Gustave Courbet, ''Portrait of Jongkind'' File:Courbet Portrait of Regis Courbet DMA.jpg|Gustave Courbet, ''Portrait of Regis Courbet, the Artist's Father'', 1848–1849 File:Courbet Still Life with Apples Pear and Pomegranates DMA.jpg|Gustave Courbet, ''Still Life with Apples, Pear, and Pomegranates'', 1871 or 1872 File:Daumier Head of Pasquin DMA.jpg|Honoré Daumier, ''Head of Pasquin'', 1862–1863 File:Degas Aria after the Ballet 1879.jpg|Edgar Degas, ''Aria After the Ballet'', 1879 File:Degas Group of Dancers DMA.jpg|Edgar Degas, ''Group of Dancers'' c.1895-c.1897 File:Degas The Bathers DMA.jpg|Edgar Degas, ''The Bathers'', c.1890-c.1895 File:Fantin-Latour Portrait of Manet.jpg|Henri Fantin-Latour, ''Portrait of Manet'', 1867 File:Frame with mirror DMA Reves Collection.jpg|Frame with mirror File:Frames France DMA Reves Collection.jpg|18th-century French mirror File:Gauguin Portrait of a man DMA.jpg|Paul Gauguin, ''Portrait of a man'', File:Le Pont Neuf - Claude Monet.jpg|Claude Monet, ''Le Pont Neuf'', 1871 File:Lise Sewing - 1866.jpg|Pierre-Auguste Renoir, ''Lise Sewing'', 1866 File:Manet Le Bouchon DMA.jpg|Édouard Manet, ''Le Bouchon'', 1878 File:Monticelli - Still Life with Sardines and Sea-Urchins.JPG|Adolphe Joseph Thomas Monticelli, ''Still Life with Sardines and Sea-Urchins'', 1880–1882 File:Morisot Port of Nice DMA.jpg|Berthe Morisot, ''The Port of Nice'', Winter 1881/1882 File:Pierre-Auguste Renoir - La Mare aux canards.jpg|Pierre-Auguste Renoir, ''La Mare aux canards'', 1873 File:Pierre-Auguste Renoir - La Seine à Chatou (1874).jpg|Pierre-Auguste Renoir, ''The Seine at Chatou'', 1874 File:Pissarro Landscape at Eragny.jpg|Camille Pissarro, ''Landscape at Eragny'', 1890 File:Pissarro Place du Theatre Francais Fog Effect DMA.jpg|Camille Pissarro, ''Place du Theatre Francais: Fog Effect'', 1890 File:Pissarro Road to Versailles Louveciennes Morning Frost DMA.jpg|Camille Pissarro, ''The Road to Versailles, Louveciennes: Morning Frost'', 1871 File:Pissarro Rue de l Hermitage Pontoise DMA.jpg|Camille Pissarro, ''La Rue de l'Hermitage, Pontoise'', 1873–1875 File:Pissarro Self portrait DMA 1985-R-44 with frame.jpg|Camille Pissarro, ''Self-portrait'', 1897–1898 (In frame) File:Redon Flowers in a black vase DMA.jpg|Odilon Redon, ''Flowers in a Black Vase'', c.1909-1910 File:Redon The Port of Morgat DMA.jpg|Odilon Redon, ''The Port of Morgat'', 1882 File:Renoir In the Studio Georges Riviere and Marguerite Legrand DMA.jpg|Pierre-Auguste Renoir, ''In the Studio (Georges Riviere and Marguerite Legrand)'', 1876–1877 File:Pierre-Auguste Renoir - Lise in a White Shawl - 1985.R.58 - Dallas Museum of Art.jpg|Pierre-Auguste Renoir, ''Lise in a White Shawl'', 1871–1872 File:Renoir The Bather DMA.jpg|Pierre-Auguste Renoir, ''The Bather'', 1880–1881 File:Rodin Je suis belle DMA 1985-R-66.jpg|Auguste Rodin, ''I Am Beautiful'', 1882 File:Rodin The Sirens DMA 1985-R-65.jpg|Auguste Rodin, ''The Sirens'', 1888 File:Sisley Road Along the Seine at Saint-Mammes DMA 1985-R-69.jpg|Alfred Sisley, ''Road Along the Seine at Saint-Mammes'', c.1880 File:Toulouse-Lautrec Dog DMA.jpg|Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, ''Dog'', 1880 File:Toulouse-Lautrec Prostitutes DMA.jpg|Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, ''Prostitutes'', 1893–1895 File:Toulouse-Lautrec The last respects DMA.jpg|Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, ''The Last Respects'', 1887 File:Vincent van Gogh. Café Terrace at Night. 1888. Reed pen and ink over pencil on laid paper, (65.4 x 47.1 cm). Dallas Museum of Art.jpg|Vincent van Gogh, ''Café Terrace at Night'', 1888 File:Wheatfield - Van Gogh.jpg|Vincent van Gogh, ''Sheaves of Wheat'', July 1890 File:Édouard Vuillard - Le Petit Restaurant (ca.1900-1901).jpg|Édouard Vuillard, ''The Little Restaurant'', 1894 File:Vuillard The Tent DMA.jpg|Édouard Vuillard, ''The Tent'', 1908 File:Édouard Manet - Espagnole à la Croix Noire.jpg|Édouard Manet, ''Espagnole à la Croix Noire'', c.1863 File:Édouard Manet - Le chanteur espagnol.jpg|Édouard Manet, ''The Spanish Singer'', 1891 </gallery>
==References== {{Reflist}} * {{cite book|last= Olivier Meslay|first= Martha MacLeod|title=From Chanel to Reves, La Pausa and its collections at the Dallas Museum of Art|year=2015|publisher=Dallas Museum of Art|isbn=978-0-936227-30-6}}
==Bibliography== * {{cite book|last= Chaney|first=Lisa|title=Coco Chanel: An Intimate Life|year=2011|publisher=Penguin|isbn=978-0-14-103685-4}} * {{cite book|last= Cosgrave|first=Bronwyn|title=Vogue on Coco Chanel|year=2013|publisher=Quadrille|isbn=978-1-84949-111-2}} * {{cite book|last= Picardie|first=Justine|title=Coco Chanel: The Legend and the Life|year=2010|publisher=Harper Collins|isbn=978-0-00-731904-6}} * {{cite book|last=Smith|first=Nancy|title=Churchill on the Riviera: Winston Churchill, Wendy Reves, and the Villa La Pausa built by Coco Chanel| year =2017|publisher=Biblio Press|isbn=978-1622493661}} *{{cite book|last= Meslay|first=Olivier|title=From Chanel to Reves: La Pausa and its Collections at the Dallas Museum of Art|year =2015|publisher=Dallas Museum of Art|isbn=978-0936227306}}
==External links== *[https://www.dma.org/audio/la-pausa-la-pausa 'La Pausa Before La Pausa' – A lecture on La Pausa by the Dallas Museum of Arts curator Olivier Meslay] *[https://uncrated.wordpress.com/2014/02/19/searching-for-chanel-at-the-dma/ 'Searching for Chanel at the DMA' – A blogpost on Coco Chanel's items from La Pausa in the Dallas Museum of Arts]
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Pausa, La}} Category:French Riviera Category:Houses completed in 1930 Category:Houses in Alpes-Maritimes Category:Villas in France Category:Winston Churchill