Introduction to Roussillon

45km (28 miles) E of Avignon; 10km (6 miles) E of Gordes

Color -- 17 shades of ocher, to be more precise -- has proven to be this village's lifeblood. The area's rich deposits of ocher have been valued ever since Roman times; beginning in the late 1700s, Roussillon's ocher powders were shipped around the world from Marseille. Though the mining industry has dried up, hordes of artists and visitors still flock here to marvel at and be inspired by the gorgeous ranges of the vibrant warm tones. Roussillon also served as a giant laboratory of sorts for the famous American sociologist Laurence William Wylie, who packed up his family and moved here for a year to study the village's complex life of work and play, love and family feuds, and simple day-to-day existence. He published his study as A Village in the Vaucluse in 1957.