French designer in costly dispute over Pitt-Jolie chateau


              FILE - This May 31, 2008 file photo, shows the Miraval property in Correns, near Brignoles, southern France, Saturday, May 31, 2008. A French lighting designer has won a $600,000 court ruling in a dispute with Brad Pitt over a grandiose re-design of his and Angelina Jolie's chateau in Provence. Designer Odile Soudant says her business went under because of Pitt's refusal to pay for costly architectural reveries, and she is now fighting for intellectual property rights over the Chateau Miraval's lighting design. (AP Photo/Lionel Cironneau, File)
FILE - This May 31, 2008 file photo, shows the Miraval property in Correns, near Brignoles, southern France, Saturday, May 31, 2008. A French lighting designer has won a $600,000 court ruling in a dispute with Brad Pitt over a grandiose re-design of his and Angelina Jolie's chateau in Provence. Designer Odile Soudant says her business went under because of Pitt's refusal to pay for costly architectural reveries, and she is now fighting for intellectual property rights over the Chateau Miraval's lighting design. (AP Photo/Lionel Cironneau, File)

PARIS (AP) - A French lighting designer has won a $600,000 court ruling in a dispute with Brad Pitt over a grandiose re-design of the chateau in Provence that he and Angelina Jolie shared.

But designer Odile Soudant isn't stopping there. She says her business went under because of Pitt's refusal to pay for costly architectural reveries, and she's now fighting for the intellectual property rights to the Chateau Miraval's lighting design.

Pitt's representatives argue the project was late and over-budget and the design was Pitt's brainchild - not hers.

Soudant's legal actions are the latest challenge for Pitt, who is in protracted divorce proceedings with Jolie.

The couple stayed at the chateau when she gave birth to their twins in nearby Monaco in 2008, launched a wine venture from its vineyards and married there in 2014.

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