SOS Children's Villages has been present in France since 1956, when the first SOS Children's Village outside Austria was established in Busigny in Northern France. The work of SOS Children's Villages has increased over the years.
The corner stone of the SOS Children's Village Châteaudun was laid on 13 November 1998, the construction of the SOS Children's Village was completed in 1999 and the very first SOS families could move to their new homes already in July 1999. The official inauguration of the most recent SOS project in France took place on 14 September 2000 in the presence of the wife of the French President, Mrs. Bernadette Chirac. The SOS Children's Village consists of ten family houses and a community centre where offices and rooms for festivities and all kind of social activities can be found.