| Juan-les-Pins | |
|---|---|
| Country: | France |
| Region: | Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur |
| Department: | Alpes-Maritimes |
| Arrondissement: | Grasse |
| Canton: | Vallauris-Antibes-Ouest |
| Municipality: | Antibes |
| Population: | ? |
| Coordinates: | |
| Time zone: | CET, UTC+1 |
| Elevation: | 10 amsl |
| Postal code: | 06600 |
Juan-les-Pins (French pronunciation: [ʒɥɑ̃ lə pɛ̃]) is a town in the commune of Antibes, in the Alpes-Maritimes, in southeastern France, on the Côte d'Azur. It is situated between Nice and Cannes, 13 km from Nice Côte d'Azur Airport.
It is a major holiday destination popular with the international jet-set, with casino, nightclubs and beaches, which are made of fine grained sand, and are not straight, but instead are cut with small inlets.
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Situated west of the town of Antibes on the western slope of the ridge, halfway to the old fishery village of Golfe-Juan (where Napoleon landed in 1815), it had been an area with lots of stone pine trees (pins in French), where the inhabitants of Antibes used to go for a promenade, for a picnic in the shadow of the stone pine trees or to collect tree branches and cones for their stoves.
The village was given the name Juan-les-Pins on 12 March 1882. The spelling Juan, used instead of the customary French spelling, Jean, derives from the local Occitan dialect. Other names discussed for the town include Héliopolis, Antibes-les-Pins and Albany-les-Pins (after the Duke of Albany, the son of Queen Victoria).
The following year, 1883, it was decided to build a railway station in Juan-les-Pins on the Paris-Lyon-Méditerranée (PLM) line that had been there since 1863.
Juan-les-Pins is famous for its annual jazz festival in July. New Orleans is a sister city, a connection which for a number of years was shown in carnival festivities in the streets of Juan-les-Pins, in which both local and New Orleans jazz bands paraded. Along the street behind the seaside stage where the annual jazz festival "Jazz à Juan" is held, one will find ceramic tiles laid into the pavement with handprints of more than 50 jazz musicians who have played at this festival, among those Al Jarreau, B. B. King, Chick Corea, Clark Terry, Dave Brubeck, Dee Dee Bridgewater, Eddy Louiss, Elvin Jones, Fats Waller, George Benson, Hank Jones, Jack DeJohnette, Joshua Redman, Keith Jarrett, Little Richard, Milt Jackson, Oscar Peterson, Pat Metheny, Ravi Coltrane, Ray Charles, Richard Galliano, Roy Haynes, Shirley Horn, Sonny Rollins, Stéphane Grappelli and Wynton Marsalis.
Peter Sarstedt famously mentions Juan-les-Pins in his 1969 UK number one hit, "Where Do You Go To (My Lovely)"; a portrait of a girl who becomes a member of the Euro jet-set. The song mentions that the girl spends her summer vacations in Juan-les-Pins. The song was featured in Wes Andersons, "Darjeeling Limited".
"Golfe Juan" is the name of a pointillist painting done by Paul Signac, a French neo-impressionist in 1896.
Juan-les-Pins is prominent in Sartre's The Reprieve, the second volume of his Roads to Freedom trilogy.
The area is also the home of Lanny Budd, the protagonist in 11 Upton Sinclair novels.
In Charles Jackson's novel The Lost Weekend, the main character, Don Birnam, mentions a holiday in Juan-les-Pins.