At Airelles Le Château de la Messardière, there will be blood—buckets of it—and not just in the form of the hotel’s house rosé: pale pink, with notes of jasmine and watermelon, served ice-cold by the pool ,and incidentally named Roseblood.
Rumor has it, according to Variety, that the Château will be used as a location in season four of The White Lotus. HBO had no comment, but if it’s true I can confidently say that this hotel, which I’ve had the privilege of visiting several times, will make the perfect setting for a season spent on the French Riviera—set high on a hilltop, with the temptations of Saint-Tropez and Pampelonne’s strip of all-day-party beach clubs below. Shopping there is an endurance sport (around 230 boutiques populate the surrounding village, which is so compact you can cross it on foot in 15 minutes). Boat invites are made freely and, if we’ve learned anything from the show, must be accepted with discretion.
Many of the leisurely parades of luxury we are now used to on The White Lotus already exist at Le Château de la Messardière. Come early evening, guests emerge from their suites to strut their evening finery (a brand parade of Loro Piana loafers, Casablanca silk shirts, Richard Mille watches, Missoni dresses, Hermès bags) and converge on the terrace for cocktails. From there, there’s a sweeping view of the manicured grounds—12 hectares of fragrant gardens and forest, parasol pines, and a lone sailboat on a far-off blue swath of sea: the Gulf of Saint-Tropez. It’s easy to imagine, say, the late Rick and Chelsea staying up to watch the sun rise here, or the Ratliff clan gathering for a tedious dinner.
In short, it is a heavenly setting. There are Instagrammable Cédric Grolet pastries at breakfast, a Kid’s Kingdom for the tots, a Valmont spa for the adults, and tennis courts worthy of Djokovic. There is also La Messardière’s private beach, Jardin Tropezina, a chic, family-friendly scene where lunch might mean platters of lobster and more rosé. Lively but tasteful: jazz at sunset, no table dancing, no champagne-spraying theatrics.
But let’s face it: even in paradisiacal palaces like this storybook turreted castle, things can go wrong in the way that they so often do for guests of a White Lotus property. Some ideas: the heavy steel ball on the pétanque court becomes a projectile; an “accidental tumble” into the duck pond; a “mishap” at their open-air gym in the woods. And if you sign up for La Messardière’s experiences—say, boxing with a champion on the Château’s yoga deck—it’s not hard to imagine a lesson turning into a public humiliation with private motives.
