Locked Down Shot, LS, HA. Daylight. View from the Castle over the Loire Valley. Chambord is the largest of the Loire castles. The young King Francois I initiated the huge enterprise of building the Chateau of Chambord in 1519. Designed by Domenico da Cortona, and maybe also by Philibert Delorme, Chambord was intended as a hunting lodge but its French Renaissance architecture makes it an extravagant chateau. Francois?sons, Henry II and Louis XIV were responsible for making Chambord look the way we see it today.