Colour, bright or subtle, is essential in any garden, whether it is dealt with from a philosophical, religious, symbolic or scientific point of view.
In gardens, as in paintings, humankind endeavours to understand and to master colour in an attempt to bring about harmonies, balancing colours by uniting their arrays and radiation.

In 2009 the International Garden Festival will demonstrate that the vegetative palette used by the artists and landscape architects creates an infinite diversity of chromatic associations, whose virtues and energy have an undeniable effect on the senses and the mind.

In stark contrast to the dull monotones of life and cities, through the use of secret codes of colour, this latest edition proposes attuned gardens of all shades, subtle, even-tempered or strongly coloured designs that play on thousands of hidden significations. We will see that it is because of tinctorial plants that the vegetal world is at the origin of many colours and pigments used by man in general and artists in particular.

Intense reds, deep blues, white or black, the gardens at Chaumont are surprising, daring and original proposals.

Michel Pastoureau, medievalist historian, irrefutable specialist and author on the subject of colour has been entrusted with the presidency of the 2009 Festival jury. Twenty gardens have been selected from almost 300 international proposals.

The offer of a, “Carte blanche”, or free hand has been extended to several personalities:

- Patrick Blanc, returning to Chaumont-sur-Loire with a new and exciting project,
- Eric Borja and Simon Crouzet, will intervene in the landscaped château grounds,
- Michel Racine et Béatrice Saurel will reinvent the “sentiers des fers sauvages”, shaded woodland walk,
- The painter, Christophe Cuzin, specialist in colours,
- Exceptional colourist and garden enthusiast, Christophe Robin.

The gardens will not only radiate colours. Designs from the 2009 edition of the Festival will also shower us with light. An absolute first for the International Garden Festival in 2009, the gardens will gleam with light emitting diodes allowing for nocturnal visits.