How would you feel to find out that your hometown had come bottom of the class? Offended, outraged or amused?
Thankfully, most residents of Valjouffrey in Isère did not seem to mind too much to discover their village came last on a 2025 list of most salubrious towns and villages in France, and there has been no sudden exodus.
The annual list, les villes et villages où il fait bon vivre, ranks all the towns and villages in mainland France based on 190 criteria including quality of life, safety, health, transport, shops and services, education, environmental factors, local taxation, solidarity, leisure, and real estate appeal.
Resident Joël Puissant tending to produce in a garden cellarMemoire Battante Valjouffrey
When the 2025 list ranked his village in bottom place, mayor Maxence Foglia took the news in good humour.
“In terms of quality of life, Valjouffrey has everything I need,” he said.
“All the people who live here are very happy, and if you like hiking and friendly people, then you’ll be right at home.
Mr Foglia moved to Valjouffrey in 2019 after a career in the restaurant business in Grenoble and feels the list tends to consider city ideas of what makes a place good to live in - an opinion echoed by many of the 151 villagers.
“Given the criteria, I think it’s a city ranking,” says Joël Puissant.
Aged 70, Mr Puissant claims he and his fellow villagers are “happy to be living in hell”, listening to the trickling stream and surrounded by the greenery of the national forest.
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Quiet and natural
Valjouffrey, 70km south of Grenoble, sits on the western side of the Ecrins massif, at an altitude of around 1,200 metres. The valley boasts marvellous forests of beech, birch, larches, blue-green firs and Scots pine, a mix that is rare in the Alps.
The scenery features rare plantlifeMaurice Pittino
Locals once made their living from sawmills or raising sheep and goats, but they have moved with the times - gently.
You will not find any hypermarkets or shopping malls here, and the nearest public services or shops are a 30-minute drive away, but you will find a close-knit community that celebrates its history.
Curious garden cellars
Among the mountains, forests and streams of Valjouffrey, you might notice some unusual dry-stone walls and what appear to be doorways into hobbit-like houses.
Underground garden cellars are a common sightMemoire Battante Valjouffrey
These are caves de jardin, underground garden cellars traditionally built from dry stone or lime, narrow and up to 10m long, with a door wide enough to bring in a wheelbarrow.
They were used to grow vegetables such as leeks, endives and celery, keeping them protected from the frosts to provide food through the winter months, which was especially vital when the village was cut off by snowfall.
No harm done
This year the village has been visited by various media thanks to its villes et villages où il fait bon vivre ranking, which gains a lot of publicity and reaches more than forty million people, many of whom like to check the website to see where their own village or town has been placed.
In any case, the locals of Valjouffrey - known as les Saparis - are not about to change their habits or way of life, continuing to welcome walkers, cyclists and low-impact tourism.
It may be a small village but it has inspired a poem by Pierre-Marie Fond'urle that concludes:
Vous ne m’oterez pas l’irrémédiable amour
Car c’est au Valjouffrey qu’est mon cœur pour toujours.
(You will not take away my irremediable love
For it is in Valjouffrey that my heart is forever.)
