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Horses have supported the development of humankind since antiquity. When they ceased to play a useful role in society during the twentieth century, this could have sealed their fate, had they not been recategorized as part of the leisure sphere and thus given new social purposes. This recategorization has also enabled equestrian activities to undergo heritage development, reflecting their change of meaning. In this article, I claim that tourism can contribute to this dynamic, focusing in particular on the case of national studs in France. I aim firstly to understand how turning the horse into an object of tourism has enabled an animal that was formerly an agricultural production tool to undergo heritage development, and secondly to understand the role of regional actors who have had a hand in this reinvention.