Sun, Sea, and the Crowned Heads of Europe - Tourism in the French Riviera During the Eighteenth, Nineteenth, and Early Twenty Centuries

Long before it became a summer destination, the French Riviera was a place to spend the winter. From the mid-18th century, doctors and travellers began recommending its mild, sunny climate, and wealthy visitors from northern Europe, many of them in poor health, started coming south. After 1815, the Riviera became an established winter health resort, and the European upper classes headed there each year to escape the cold.

Tobias Smollet and Pallid British Invalids

The Scottish writer Tobias Smollett was one of the first to make the Riviera known in Britain. Suffering from asthma and lung problems, he was advised to seek a dry, sunny climate, and he lived in Nice between 1763 and 1765. His account, Travels through France and Italy, published in 1766, described Nice in detail, from its history and its people to its weather, which he recorded carefully. He also bathed in the sea there, at a time when this was still unusual.

The book helped make the Riviera fashionable with British travellers, and Smollett was later described as the discoverer of the Côte d’Azur, even if his frank opinions did not make him popular with the locals.

The Rise of Cannes

In 1834, the British statesman Lord Brougham was travelling through Cannes, then a small fishing village, when a cholera outbreak further along the coast stopped him from continuing. He fell in love with the place and built a house there, the Château Éléonore.

Wealthy visitors followed his example, building their own villas, and modern Cannes began to take shape. More than a century later, the town would host its first film festival in 1946, after the original edition, planned for September 1939, was cancelled by the war.

Railways and Gambling

In the 1850s, Monaco was struggling. Prince Charles III opened a gambling house, but poor roads and sea links kept visitors away. In 1863, he created the Société des Bains de Mer, led by the casino owner François Blanc, and in 1866 the Spélugues district was renamed Monte-Carlo, the Mountain of Charles, in the Prince’s honour.

The railway changed everything. The first train on the Paris-Lyon-Mediterranean line reached Monaco in 1868, and the Monte-Carlo station opened the following year, with lifts taking passengers directly up to the gaming rooms. As gambling was banned elsewhere in Europe, aristocrats and visitors flocked to Monaco.

Queen Victoria’s Hotel Takeover

Queen Victoria was the most famous of the Riviera’s winter visitors. She stayed in Menton in 1882, visited Cannes in 1885, Grasse in 1891 and Hyères in 1892, before returning to Nice several times from 1895.

Her first stay in Nice was at the Grand Hôtel in Cimiez. For her last three visits, she stayed at the Excelsior Régina Palace, also in Cimiez, a hotel built with her needs in mind. A trip planned for 1900 was cancelled, and she never returned.

Changing, But Staying The Same

In the 1920s, the Riviera changed season. In 1922, the American couple Gerald and Sara Murphy persuaded the Hôtel du Cap to stay open past its usual closing date in May, and spent the summer on the Garoupe beach, at a time when most foreigners left. Their hospitality at Villa America drew writers and artists to the Riviera in summer.

The same year, the luxury train later known as Le Train Bleu returned to service, with first-class sleeping cars running from Calais to the Riviera. In 1928, Coco Chanel bought La Pausa, a villa near Monaco. The visitors and the season had changed, but the Riviera remained a place of glamour and prestige.

Open To All

In 1936, the Popular Front introduced two weeks of paid holiday for French workers, along with reduced train fares in August. The same year, second and third-class sleeping cars were added to the Blue Train for French holidaymakers.

After the Second World War, mass tourism took off in the 1950s. The Riviera was no longer reserved for the crowned heads of Europe, but it never lost the elegance that had first drawn them there.

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