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Villages

5 tips to be accepted into French village life

Foreign newcomers drawn to the country idyl should not remain passive observers

Villagers surprised by soldier invasion during French army exercise

Resident: ‘I opened my shutters and saw soldiers firing right in front of me’

Billy, Lucy, Alex: Is there a French town or village with your name?

You can check on the map below or review the data yourself

news

PHOTOS: Villages selected for new ‘favourite in France’ title

The public is invited to vote for their favourite on the shortlist in the 12th annual TV contest

Dordogne villagers raise €170,000 in days to open petrol station

Mayor says the project will help stop people travelling out of town to fill their cars and shop

Two more villages awarded prestigious ‘most beautiful in France’ title

The Plus Beaux Villages de France judges carefully consider 32 criteria across heritage, history, architecture and the environment

French village resorts to bizarre way of stopping cars from speeding

Forget cameras, squiggly white lines could be the new way of slowing cars

France's geographical heart: where does the country's centre lie?

The controversial village at the heart of France

Find Paris’s secret village hidden in the bustling Marais district

Independent shops and tranquil courtyards - you can forget finding the maze-like Village Saint-Paul on Google Maps

Utopian living runs in the family in French village of Fontaine-Daniel

We discover how workers’ rights and social harmony have been promoted for more than a century at a former cotton mill in the Mayenne village of Fontaine-Daniel

Which village in France has been crowned the country’s favourite?

The winner has an impressive cultural output given its size

Meet Nicolas Sarkozy’s former communications chief, Thierry Saussez

He discusses his brainchild Villes & Villages: où il fait bon vivre, and his business that aims to defeat French pessimism

These are the French villages most searched on Google

With spring in full flow and several bank holidays on the horizon, which French villages are the most popular?

Idea to revitalise rural areas in France: the ‘smart village’

The trend for ‘smart cities’ could be applied to villages to revitalise rural communities

‘Ghost areas’: The places in France where no one lives

There is also a village in France that has only one resident and another just two, a new map shows

The ‘ideal town of tomorrow’ imagined by the French public

Independent neighbourhoods, more greenery and better transport links were among the ‘must haves’ identified. The study will inform 2022 presidential election candidate campaigns

Angers and Guéthary ranked best town and village to live in France

The Loire Valley town and Basque Country village have taken the top spot this year, in a ranking that considers 187 criteria across nine categories of local infrastructure and facilities

French hamlet unites with shared cow and a milking rota

Villagers have bought a cow to provide fresh milk – and a milking rota is proving an ideal way to bring neighbours together

The French village whose pocket knives are a cut above

The plateau-perched village of Laguiole in the south of France is where knives and cheese keeps its small economy booming

Billboards: Are these the four 'ugliest' towns or villages in France?

Environmental association awards ‘prizes’ for second year running, to raise awareness of an “invasion” of advertising signs sprawled across France’s towns and villages

Why are France’s new identity cards translated into English?

The decision to include English as well as French on the new cards prompted controversy, with a member of the Académie française calling it ‘insulting’

The reason why this southern French village survived the great plague

Uncover the history of the village of Lautrec, which has a beautiful church, a majestic windmill and a special geological feature that helped its inhabitants survive the plague

Sancerre: Locals raise a glass to France’s newest ‘Favourite Village’

Hilltop commune surrounded by vineyards in central France gets TV viewers’ vote

This bijou French village perches majestically between rock and river

La Roque-Gageac in Dordogne is a micro-village with micro-climate, with traces of human habitation dating back to 25-35,000 BC

French village’s action to stop Waze sending cars onto its rural roads

Villagers take action after sat-nav system guides thousand of drivers through country roads to avoid congestion on nearby busy autoroute

Explore the Alpine village in France where winter is only just ending

The picturesque village of Bonneval-sur-Arc near the Italian border endures eight winter months out of twelve

Dordogne: Mars rocks and craters named after French villages

NASA’s Curiosity rover recently discovered a link between the red planet and the department in southwest France

Cast your vote to decide France's Favourite Village 2021

As popular France 3 TV show returns to our screens, see which village is carrying the flag for your region

Must I inform the mairie when I buy a home in France?

We explain whether registering at the mairie is a legal obligation, or just a good idea, when you move into a new commune in France

France’s favourite village boasts old-style houses

Hunspach in Alsace has been voted France’s favourite village for 2020.

France’s favourite village: Which will win tomorrow's vote?

Fourteen villages will tomorrow compete for the crown of "France's favourite village", in the annual competition and TV show to celebrate French heritage.

France’s first Alzheimer's village opens after Covid delay

Specially created village is based on models from the Netherlands

France’s first ‘Alzheimer village’ mirrors local life

France’s first Alzheimer’s village is set to welcome its first residents at the end of this month.

Villagers in France banned from being ill

A dozen small-town mayors have highlighted the lack of rural doctors by signing a symbolic decree making it illegal for local residents to fall ill or die.

First 24 French 'rural café' villages are chosen

The first 24 villages have been selected to receive funding and help to open a café under a scheme to fund 1,000 of them in rural areas.

MPs plan to protect France's rural noises and smells

Bill to be heard this week would make rural sounds and aromas part of the 'sensory heritage of the countryside'

2-year study reveals the best place to live in France

Survey studied official data on education, shops and services, health, sports and leisure, solidarity, quality of life, and transport to come up with 'definitive' ranking of nearly 35,000 villages, towns and cities

French village is a real-life Advent calendar

Each year a tiny village turns itself into a real-life Advent calendar, with residents opening their doors on a different evening from December 1 to 24 to welcome visitors with drinks and snacks.

French local history – November 2019

France’s favourite village an ancient English landing site. The Connexion looks back at the war-trodden history of picturesque coastal town Saint-Vaast-la-Hougue, not far from Cherbourg

French village split as mayor sparks woodpile battle

A village is split over its mayor’s determination to remove a woodpile from the front of a house.

French local history – October 2019

The last earthly remains of villages that died for France - The Connexion recounts the history of nine Meuse villages that were destroyed in the First World War, but live on in French memory

Country sounds are part of rural French life

Second home-owners, get over it...

The French village where everyone is maire

Vandoncourt has been called “the village with 600 mayors”... only now there are more like 800 of them.

'Give French countryside sounds protected status'

Mayor calls on MPs to make sounds of the French countryside to be listed as part of the country's 'national heritage'

Life in slow lane catches on... a town at a time

Sleepy villages abound in France, as anyone who has travelled off the motorways in summer will tell you.

French steak knife village Laguiole wins right to name

Laguiole, the French village famous for its steak knives of the same name, has been granted the right to ban companies that are using the name - but are actually located elsewhere - from doing so.

French village’s surprise €4.5m

A villager left €4.5million as a surprise gift to her commune – four times its annual budget – in her will.

Row over how loud bells toll

Village faces five-figure bill if court rules church bells are ringing too loud

Pesticide ban and ‘new’ ways to beat weeds

After farmers using the common pesticide metam sodium had difficulty breathing, it was banned in France until February for tests. Similar fears on other pesticides prompted a national ban on councils using chemicals in parks and, as Brian McCulloch finds, encouraged other ways of working

Villages

5 tips to be accepted into French village life

Villagers surprised by soldier invasion during French army exercise

Billy, Lucy, Alex: Is there a French town or village with your name?

PHOTOS: Villages selected for new ‘favourite in France’ title

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2024 Map: see where in France road speeds are reverting to 90km/h limit

French ski station voted as best in the world

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Ignoring this increasingly common French road sign could cost you €135

Free data leak: is it possible to change French bank account number?

Learning French: when to use d'ailleurs versus par ailleurs?