Are all hotels in France hideous chateaux with grand furniture and dismal old carpets or am I looking in the wrong places?

[Enid]

I hate those old chateaux. Has the concept of a friendly family hotel not hit France yet?

i.e any recommendations in Normandy or the Loire?

Well, the Auberge de la Croix Blanche in Fontevraud, near Saumur, was very welcoming a few years back, but it was neither boutiquey nor Bedruthan Steps-y.
Tbh Enid I think the kind of light, pretty, modern hotels that are catching on the UK can only be found in a handful of really luxe French destinations, or ones popular with weekending Brits. That tends to rule out inland France, or anywhere south of the Loire. I know a gorgeous hotel in Lille and one in the Ile de Re that might fit your requirements...and an awful lot of places with carpet on the walls elsewhere
We liked the Auberge a) because it was friendly and on the lively side for a provincial French hotel, selling ice-creams and crepes in the courtyard after 9pm on a weekday, which is about as heaving as it gets
b) because you have opposite you the outstandingly interesting Abbaye de Fontevraud, where Richard the Lionheart and his ghastly mother are buried. It is semi-ruined, huge, loads of room for small children to have a canter with their dad while their mother regroups for the rest of the journey.

I am such a ponce

I only like those kind of hotels now

We have found a Babington a like in the Dordogne for later in the journey

tbh if it is clean and welcoming with a good mattress it will be fine

Ya ponce
Embrace the carpets! Feel the khaki paint!
I will not direct you to the Barton Fink type establishment dh and I once stayed in pre-kids in Blois

formule 1 embraces minimalism

Not enid-stylee though I suspect

have gone scuzzy and booked a best western

with TV!
and a pool!

will have enough typical French blah di blah when we get there