Water, nature, and its reflections have always inspired Claude Monet in his paintings. In 1893, he bought land located at the bottom of Clos Normand, on the other bank of the railway line in Giverny. He had the course of the Ru, a small arm of the Epte, diverted to create a water garden. The site's small pond, spanned by a Japanese bridge, was the inspiration for countless paintings by Monet due to its color-changing water lilies.