On August 11, 2026, Inès de la Fressange celebrates her 69th birthday. The former Chanel muse, who has become a defining figure in the fashion world, has long nurtured a voracious love for Provence. A region where she experienced a true real estate love affair that would later turn into a high-profile legal saga. “When I arrived, I cried out, ‘I’m buying!’,” she recalled about discovering a mas in the Montagnette, in Tarascon. But that Provencal dream soon collided with a tougher reality: an annexe built without a permit on a protected natural site, which today leaves her facing a demolition order.
A Love at First Sight for Provence
Born in Saint-Tropez, Inès de la Fressange discovered the Camargue at the age of 30, at the moment she met the father of her children. “I fell in love with the region and with the father of my children. I can’t even tell which came first, they’re so intertwined,” she joked, describing herself as the volunteer ambassador of Tarascon.
On location, her habits changed radically. She swapped the Paris pace for wandering the local market, savoring tomatoes, sheep’s milk cheeses, and tapenades. “In Paris, it bores me; it’s too cold. Tarascon’s market is perfect,” she explained, also recounting horseback rides at a friend’s ranch and her regular pastis moments with her friend Mireille.
This passion even found its way into the decor of her Provencal mas, with flea-market furniture, striped fabrics, and local ceramics. Architect Marcelo Joulia completely redesigned the spaces, whitening the walls to create a sober yet warm atmosphere. “For me, decorating and fashion have a lot in common,” she summarized, true to a celebrated aesthetic sense.
An Annex Built Without Permits on a Protected Site
This idyllic tableau darkened abruptly starting in 2015. The SCI she runs had erected, below the main house, a 100 m² annex by the pool, without a building permit. A project carried out in the middle of a protected ecological, floristic, and faunal zone, a Montagnette-designated area.
The judiciary did not delay in ruling. The referral judge in Tarascon, followed by the Aix-en-Provence Court of Appeal, confirmed the demolition obligation for this construction, under a daily penalty of €300. The judges denounced a “clearly illicit disturbance,” pointing to clearing and earth movements on this protected site.
The president of the ADER association, which initiated the case, did not mince words at the time, describing a genuine “Provencal permit strategy.” “They build and then try to regularize everything afterward,” he charged, contending that this practice often benefited influential regional figures—hunters, unions, or celebrities.
The mayor of Tarascon likewise expressed puzzlement over the affair. “It’s surprising they went about it this way; they must have suspected someone would notice the works,” the official said, before meeting with the model and her partner, Denis Olivennes, to discuss possible regularization. The SCI’s lawyers, for their part, denounced “insults in the press” and drone intrusions onto the property.
That legal battle ultimately brought a definitive end to Inès de la Fressange’s architectural dream in Tarascon. The contentious building, described by her own lawyers as a “very pretty structure” built in dry-stone and overgrown with vegetation, had to be razed, closing years of proceedings between the model and local authorities.
A Cascade of Legal Troubles
This demolition case wasn’t the only legal headache for Inès in Tarascon. Her former housekeeper, who lived in a mobile home on the property with her son, filed a suit at the labor court alleging undeclared work and wrongful dismissal. An amicable settlement, the terms of which remain confidential, ultimately brought the case to a close.
Despite these repeated troubles, Inès de la Fressange’s attachment to Provence never wavered. She continues to celebrate the region where she finds, she says, a renewed sense of wonder—between the Camargue sunsets and Tarascon’s unique atmosphere—despite the administrative setbacks she faced there. Today, while the former model splits her time between Paris and other fully regularized properties, the Montagnette episode remains emblematic of a temperament well known: a woman who follows her passions, sometimes without fully weighing the regulatory consequences at the moment. A costly lesson, but one that hardly seems to have diminished her love for this Southern region she still visits every summer.
