A climb up to the summit of Monte Bignone (around 1 300m) is well worth the effort to savour the superb panorama over San Remo and the western coast of the Ligurian Riviera.

Dominating the sea, this 17C villa, with its Sienna earth colour, houses around 30 paintings by Matisse (1869-1954). From dark palettes to canvases lit with the Mediterranean sun, then, after a stay in Morocco, to pure colour, and finally to the refined drawing of cut papers in absolute blue poster paint. 54 bronzes, sketches and models complete the panorama.

This museum is set up in a charming museum designed by Charles Garnier. Inside you will see 400 dolls, from the 18C to the present day, re-enacting scenes of everyday life. The dolls are intermingled with a hundre 19C automatum exhibits, that are set off several times a day. An immense 18C Napolitan crèche provides the finishing touch to this museum. Outside, in the rose garden, amidst other sculptures, you will.see a Young Fawn by Carpeau.

Luxurious villas, gardens with exotic fragrances: high society has given this quarter its taste for pastiche, for neo and for Oriental luxury... but you will not see much of these buildings hidden behind luxuriant vegetation unless you go to a cinema-club. The Mystery of the yellow room by Marcel Lherbier was shot in the chateau Scott which is neo-Gothic; and Jean Delannoy shot some scenes from Macao, l'enfer du jeu in the Villa Champfleuri.