Le 1550.Les 3 Vallées on the doorstep.
Seven days high above Courchevel. Serious skiing, a gorgeous private house, long lunches on the mountain and a week lived in French.
The house
The mountain, taken seriously.
Le 1550 stands in Les Brigues, a quiet hamlet above Courchevel 1550 — modernist lines, Alpine craft, and Les 3 Vallées on the doorstep. Boots dry by the door, the fire is lit before you are back down, and the spa is waiting. This is the week for people who came to ski.
- Eight ensuite bedrooms, exclusively ours for the week
- Terrace with a fire pit and dining table for twelve
- Ski room opening straight onto the slope, boots stored and warmed in-house
- Heated indoor pool
- Hammam, indoor and outdoor saunas
- Nordic hot tub overlooking the mountains
- Treatment room and Technogym fitness room
- A private chef and butler in the house
- Breakfast before the mountain, dinner when you come home
- An honesty bar, and the cheese board nobody quite leaves alone
- Chalet manager and concierge
- Private chauffeur throughout the week
- Ski and boot fitting arranged in-house
- Everything on the mountain arranged before you arrive
- Media room for comfy evenings in
The week, day by day
How the week runs.
This is a sample itinerary and is subject to change based on the seasonality of experiences and the conditions on the mountain.
Arrive above Courchevel
The fire is already lit when you arrive at Le 1550. Settle in, meet the people you will share the week with, watch the valley turn blue outside and let the French begin over the first glass and dinner.
Languages have always been, for me, a quiet kind of superpower.
I've spent most of my life moving between languages, cultures and places, and nearly fifteen years teaching other people to do the same. But what has kept me fascinated all this time isn't really the language itself. It's what happens because of it. The people you would never otherwise have spoken to. The joke you suddenly understand. The table you become part of. The moment a place stops feeling quite so foreign because, for once, you understand what is happening around you.
That's what I wanted these weeks to capture.
Not language lessons transplanted somewhere beautiful. A week that you experience differently because French is part of it. In Courchevel, it happens on the mountain, over dinner, through the people we meet and in those spontaneous conversations that often become the ones you remember.
I'll be there throughout, bringing the French into the week in a way that works for you, whether you're arriving with a handful of words or years of the language behind you. Not every moment needs to become a lesson. Quite the opposite. I want the French to give you more of the moment you're already in.
And somewhere along the way, something shifts.
You stop reaching for the French. It starts coming to you.
What is included
Everything that belongs to the week.
- 6 nights
- 2 ski groups
- Les 3 Vallées
- Six nights at Le 1550, taken exclusively
- Chef-cooked dinners at the house, including the welcome and final dinners
- Spa and recovery at the house
- Private transfers within the programme
- Private ski instruction, grouped by level
- Lift passes for the ski days
- The Learn&Co French programme and a specialist in the house all week
- Pre-trip level conversation and a personal continuation plan
Flights and travel to the Alps; ski and boot hire, which we arrange for you; travel insurance, which is required; mountain lunches, chosen with the instructors day by day and paid for separately; spa treatments; additional private coaching or off-piste guiding; extra nights before or after the week; and personal purchases, along with anything not listed above.
One price, the whole week.
Dates are being confirmed. Register your interest below and you will hear first.
For the first four.
The Founding Circle is reserved for the first four guests to join each new departure. It is not an early-bird discount. It marks the people who choose to be there at the very beginning of a new Learn&Co immersive experience.
Founding Circle guests receive:
- £500 Founding Circle benefit
- First choice of rooms
- A private language coaching session ahead of the retreat
- An intimate dinner with Maria at one of the destination's exceptional restaurants, while the rest of the group has dinner at the house
Four guests, Maria, one exceptional restaurant and a proper evening together.
Le 1550, in full
Six nights in this house.
Kind words
“I did not expect French to get under my skin in the way it did.”
Maria has a gift for creating that kind of space. Nothing felt forced, but nothing felt accidental either. The whole week had taste, warmth and intelligence behind it.
The more the week unfolded, the more natural it became. French was simply part of what was happening: a story being told, a question I wanted to answer, a conversation I did not want to miss.
Somewhere between the long lunches, the walks, the wine, the laughter and conversations that kept going, something shifted. I stopped thinking quite so hard about the French and started using it because I actually wanted to say things.
I came home with something I hadn’t expected: French was starting to come naturally to me.
Before you ask
The questions people actually ask.
Comfortable on blues and reds. Instruction is grouped by level, so strong skiers are not held back and confident intermediates are not chased down the mountain.
It is a serious ski week in which the language is genuinely lived. Skiing is the engine; French is the spine. Neither is bolted on.
Any. Support is set per person rather than per group, and nothing about the week requires you to be fluent.
Courchevel is about the scale of Les 3 Vallées: serious skiing, huge terrain and days that can take you a very long way from where you started. Megève has a different rhythm, with beautiful skiing but more of the village becoming part of the week: its market, its makers, its restaurants and the life happening below the mountain.
Yes, and many guests do. You take your room; building the rest of the house is our job.
Yes. If you're travelling with a partner or friend, you can share a twin or double room for £14,400 per person. If you'd prefer a room to yourself, the private-room rate is £18,000.
Geneva is the airport, and private transfers to and from the house are included. The drive is around two and a half hours in normal winter conditions.
Mountain lunches are not included. We choose where to stop with the instructors around the conditions, the skiing and where the day has taken us.
You leave with a personal French continuation plan and a private follow-up session included, taken once you are home. The point is that the week starts something rather than finishing it.
We’ll review your request, confirm the dates and your skiing and language levels, and make sure the week is right for you. Only then will you be invited to take a place. Nothing is taken at registration.
Which week has your attention?
Where to go next
Every Learn&Co week, in France and in Italy.
The other Alpine week: a village, a market, and one of the great Alpine tables.
A house in the Alpilles, and Provence at its own pace.
Looking for French lessons instead? Explore French →