Mougins: Picasso's village, FAMM and the photo centre
Mougins stands six kilometres from the sea, north of Cannes, and is laid out like a snail: the streets spiral in rings around a hill, and inside the ring are a square, a church and a dozen restaurants. People come here for three things: Picasso, who lived here for the last twelve years of his life, the museums and the food.
The village curled into a spiral
The medieval layout has been preserved in full. From the fortifications there remain the Porte Sarrazine — 15th-century gates with machicolations — and stretches of the defensive wall, and above the roofs stands the church of Saint-Jacques-le-Majeur with its clock tower, visible from the road. The commune has 19,782 inhabitants (2023), but the old village is home to only a few hundred: the rest of Mougins has spread over the hills with villas, pines and golf courses. You can walk around the historic core in an hour, and this is one of those occasions when an hour is worth spending.
Picasso at Notre-Dame-de-Vie
In 1961 Picasso bought a mas — a Provençal farmhouse — in the hamlet of Notre-Dame-de-Vie to the east of the village, next to the chapel of the same name, which was listed as a historic monument as early as 1927. He worked there for the final twelve years of his life and died there on 8 April 1973; it is for this reason that Mougins is known worldwide.
The house is private and cannot be visited. Visitors go to see the chapel and the olive terraces around it — the landscape for which the artist moved inland from the coast, away from the Cannes public.
FAMM: the first museum in Europe dedicated to women artists
On 21 June 2024 the village saw the opening of FAMM — Femmes Artistes Musée Mougins, the first museum in Europe entirely devoted to women in art. It has taken over the building of the Museum of Classical Art, which was assembled by British collector Christian Levett: he reinterpreted the collection and gave the rooms to women artists.
The exhibition contains more than a hundred works by roughly eighty artists — from Impressionism to contemporary art, from Berthe Morisot and Leonor Fini to Leonora Carrington, Lee Krasner and Joan Mitchell. Address — 32 rue du Commandeur. Upcoming dates: 14 October — a session of the “L’Heure FAMM” series, a lecture on Eva Gonzalès; from 6 November 2026 to 4 April 2027 the Centre d’Art de Mougins will present “In Plain Sight” by Swiss artist Louisa Gagliardi, an exhibition assembled by curator Simon de Pury.
The Centre de la Photographie and the Villers legacy
The village’s second museum is the Centre de la Photographie at 43 rue de l’Église. It grew out of the André Villers photography museum, which closed in 2019 and reopened after renovations in July 2021. Villers (1930–2016) was a friend of Picasso and his regular photographer; the centre’s collection includes more than three hundred of his works, and its temporary exhibitions show contemporary photography.
Roger Vergé and “Les Étoiles de Mougins”
The village’s gastronomic reputation grew out of Le Moulin de Mougins — Roger Vergé’s restaurant in the old mill. In Vergé’s honour the Les Étoiles de Mougins festival has been held since 2006: it now takes place every two years, in even-numbered years, in September, and gathers more than a hundred chefs from around the world for demonstrations, masterclasses, tastings and competitions. It is the largest gastronomic event on the Côte d’Azur.
How to get there and what’s nearby
From Cannes station — less than fifteen minutes by car, from Nice airport — about half an hour; junction 42 off the A8 motorway. In September and October Mougins hosts an organ music festival with concerts until 11 October, and if you are planning a day down by the sea our guide Cannes for any budget will come in handy.
Details — on the websites of Mougins town hall, FAMM, Centre de la Photographie and the Les Étoiles de Mougins festival.
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Photo: Rinaldi / Wikimedia Commons