PARIS: French President Emmanuel Macron on Saturday celebrated his birthday at the iconic chateau of King Francois I, a choice denounced by critics as an example of how he is "cut off from the people".
Macron, who turns 40 on Thursday, is spending the weekend with his wife Brigitte and extended family at the chateau of Chambord in France’s Loire Valley, the French daily La Nouvelle Republique reported.
With its fairy tale facade, elaborately turreted roofline and vast grounds, Chambord is probably the valley’s best-known Renaissance chateau, located about 200 kilometres southwest of Paris.
Macron and his family will stay at one of the cottages on the vast estate, French media said, with a birthday gala to be held Saturday evening in one of the castle’s 440 rooms.
The estate has several four-star guest houses which can be rented for 800 to 1,000 euros per weekend.
The Elysee Palace said Macron and his wife were using private funds to pay for their stay.
But the choice of venue was still criticised from some French politicians.
"Why is he celebrating his birthday at Chambord?" asked radical-left firebrand Jean-Luc Melenchon, quoted in the newspaper Le Figaro.
"What a strange idea! I am so republican that everything about royal symbols exasperates me, I find it ridiculous," he said.
"While the French suffer from taxes, insecurity, immigration, Macron celebrates his 40th birthday at Chambord," rightwing politician Nicolas Dupont-Aignan said on Twitter.
"Eras go by but the oligarchy remains cut off from the people," he said.
Commissioned nearly 500 years ago by King Francois I (1494-1547), the immense chateau remains the largest of the Loire grand estates, boasting 365 chimneys and a 5,500-hectare estate.
It also has boasts the largest enclosed forest park in Europe, a long-time favourite for presidential hunts.
The chateau, which attracts some two million visitors each year, has been listed as a regional Unesco World Heritage cultural site.
Macron, a media darling during his campaign, has seen his image as a monarchical or even "pharaonic" leader climb from the night of his election, which featured a theatrical production at the foot of the Louvre pyramid in Paris.
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