Château Dufresne

This guide to Chateau Dufresne in Montreal starts with the twenty concrete pillars poured in 1915 that hold up a facade modeled on the Petit Trianon, Marie Antoinette's retreat near Versailles. It follows engineer Marius Dufresne and his brother, shoe manufacturer Oscar Dufresne, who hired Parisian architect Jules Renard to design the mansion, and the wildly disputed cost estimates that followed, from thirty thousand dollars in 1915 to guesses reaching a million. Look at where the pale stone facing meets the concrete beneath it, the seam between two very different building stories.