The story of this place
Rising straight out of the sea between the islands of Aix and Oléron, the oval stone Fort Boyard was conceived under Louis XIV and Vauban to protect the Rochefort arsenal from the English fleet, but building a fortress on a shifting sandbank in the open Atlantic defeated engineers for generations. Work stalled repeatedly and only finished around 1857, by which time the range of naval artillery had advanced so far that the fort was useless the moment it was completed. It briefly held political prisoners, then was abandoned to the waves for a century. From 1990 it gained a wholly unexpected second life as the star set of a hit French adventure game show, broadcast worldwide, its silhouette now instantly recognisable.