Twenty-four reasons
to leave the beach towel.

The French Riviera has always attracted people who wanted to live a little differently.

Artists, writers, aristocrats, dancers, heiresses. Some came for the sunshine. Others for the freedom, the company, or the possibility of becoming someone they couldn't quite be elsewhere.

And quite a few of them were women.

There was a painter who saw something extraordinary in an ordinary stretch of coastline. A young tennis player who made the sport look nothing like it had before. An architect who designed a house so carefully that even its furniture had a purpose.

And a woman who built an entire villa around her own rather spectacular ideas of beauty.

Money certainly helped.

But not every story along this coast belongs to the wealthy or famous.

There are women whose names survived in local legends, others whose courage was remembered in places far removed from the glamorous seaside, and a young artist who left behind an extraordinary record of her life.

Some stories begin in gardens overlooking the Mediterranean. Others in a chapel, a railway station, an old cemetery, or a building you might walk past on your way to the beach.

That's the fascinating thing about the Riviera.

It has spent more than a century perfecting its image as a place of effortless beauty.

But many of the women who shaped it worked extraordinarily hard.

They painted, designed, performed, experimented, questioned, and occasionally caused considerable discomfort to people who preferred things exactly as they were.

They didn't all come looking for freedom. And the Riviera didn't offer the same possibilities to everyone.

Yet their stories have become part of this coastline, often in ways that aren't immediately obvious.

Twenty-four places offer a closer look.

You might find yourself admiring a garden for reasons that have nothing to do with its flowers. Or standing outside an elegant villa wondering about the woman who imagined it.

The Mediterranean will still look exactly as it did before.

The Riviera, perhaps a little less so.

You don't need to know what happens before you go. You only need somewhere worth walking toward.

JUNO PORTALS is designed primarily for women traveling alone.

That doesn't mean every experience has to be solitary. It means the product starts from a simple reality: sometimes you're already here, the day is yours, and you'd like a reason to go somewhere you might otherwise have passed.

Read the access note for the portal you choose. Some places are further out than they look on the map, and some are private or working places you only see from outside.

BUILT AT FULL SCALE and A GARDEN SAVED FROM DEBT need a ticket or paid entry.

PRESSED, NOT POSED depends on opening hours.

Prices and hours change. Check them on the day.

Curiosity gets you there. Your judgment always comes first.