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Brief Guide to the Top Ten Things to do in Paris |
| 1. Louvre |
| One of the world's greatest art collections, the Musée du Louvre is a 'must-see' place that every visitor to Paris should find time for - and that means at least three hours. In fact, you could spend several days here, and many art-lovers do, returning each day to explore another part of this vast collection. Entering through the natty, ultra modern glass pyramids designed by the Chinese-American I.M. Pei in the 1980s, the visitor is propelled into a well-designed, colour-coded sequence of galleries containing countless famous paintings and sculptures, including the Venus de Milo, Leonardo da Vinci's Virgin of the Rocks and Virgin and Child with St Anne, Raphael's portrait of Baldassare Castiglione, Theodore Géricault's vast Raft of the Medusa, and many, many, many more (35,000, to be precise). Most famous of all, of course, is Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa (La Joconde in French) recently re-sited to accommodate the visitors who come to pay homage to her quivering smile at the rate of 2000 per hour. The Louvre started out as a royal collection, founded by the Renaissance king François I in the early 16th century in the palace called Le Louvre; later kings added to the building, and maintained a tradition of housing artists here. It became a public museum in 1793, after the French Revolution, and has been growing ever since. Besides painting and sculpture, from the ancient world to the 19th century, the collection includes priceless furniture and objets d'art. From 2006, the superb collection of ethnic art and artefacts from Africa, Asia, Oceania and the Americas will be housed in the new Musée du Quai Branly. www.louvre.fr |
| 2. Musée d'Orsay |
| Since 1986, this ingeniously converted railway station on the south ('left') bank of the River Seine has been home to Paris's splendid collection of art of the late 19th century (1848 to 1914, to be precise) - the era when Paris was at the cutting edge of modern art. It includes famous works by Courbet, Corot, Millet and Manet, and sculpture by Rodin, but most celebrated of all is the collection of Impressionist and Post-Impressionist paintings. Find here a dazzling and stimulating array of many of the greatest works by the four key Impressionists - Renoir, Monet, Sisley, Pissarro - as well as work by Van Gogh, Cézanne, Degas, Seurat, Toulouse-Lautrec, Gauguin, Henri 'Le Douanier' Rousseau, Vuillard, Bonnard, plus dreamy Symbolist paintings and exquisite Art Nouveau jewellery and sculpture. www.musee-orsay.fr |
| 3. Eiffel Tower |
| Being such a familiar icon, the Eiffel Tower may seem like a banal cliché. But don’t be mistaken. It remains a breathtaking feat of engineering, which you can only really appreciate by standing beneath it and on it. Visiting the Eiffel Tower is an exhilarating experience. Built almost entirely of iron, and rising to 300 m (986 ft), it was designed by the engineer Gustave Eiffel as a key feature of the 1889 Exposition Universelle, a massive international fair held in Paris to mark the centenary of the French Revolution. The second level at 115m (377ft) is accessible by stairs as well as lifts; the top level at 276m (905ft) is accessible by lift only. Choose a bright day, because the views over Paris are unparalleled. www.tour-eiffel.fr |
| 4. Pompidou Centre |
| The Beaubourg was once a rather drab inner city residential area just to the north of the River Seine. Then during the 1970s this weird, wacky and wonderful building appeared in its midst like some kind of alien space ship. The 'Centre Pompidou' was completed in 1977, designed by the British architect Richard Rogers and his Italian colleague Renzo Piano. Their aim was to create a dynamic and flexible cultural hub, with a radical building that was built 'inside out'. In most buildings, the structural supports as well as the services (such as the pipework, air ducts and escalators) are neatly hidden inside, but here the architects have thrust them onto the outside to free up the interior spaces - and then made a virtue of them by painting them in vivid colours. Named after Georges Pompidou, President of France from 1969 to 1974, but also known simply as the 'Beaubourg', it runs a continuous programme of cultural events. It also houses the Musée National d'Art Moderne, with an impressive collection of 20th-century art, picking up where the Musée d'Orsay leaves off, with Fauvism (Matisse, Derain), Cubism (Picasso, Braque), and Surrealism (Dali, Magritte), plus work by Chagall, Modigliani, Giacometti, Miró, Calder, Warhol and many others. www.cnac-gp.fr |
| 5. Notre-Dame de Paris |
| The Cathedral of 'Our Lady of Paris' one of the great Gothic churches of Europe. It was built on the Île de la Cité on the River Seine between 1163 and 1345; the distinctive twin towers of its western front were completed in 1225. Notre-Dame was one of the first cathedrals to be built in Gothic style, and one of the first to use flying buttresses on the outside as an ingenious way to support the high interior vault and large areas of window. It remains famous above all for its sculpture and its grotesque gargoyles as well as its stained glass; its North and South Rose windows date back to the 13th century. However, much of its original, ornate interior was destroyed by Protestants in the 16th century, and in the anti-clerical chaos of the French Revolution. The cathedral's state of disrepair inspired Victor Hugo to write his Gothic novel The Hunchback of Notre Dame in 1831, which helped to stimulate the restoration that has led to its condition today: serene and stately, and at the heart of French religious life. |
| 6. Sainte-Chapelle |
| The 'Holy Chapel' of the French kings is one of the most exquisite of all pieces of Gothic architecture. Built between 1246 and 1248 on the Île de la Cité, it was originally the chapel of a royal palace that has since disappeared. The prime mover was Louis IX (reigned 1226-70), also known as Saint Louis, who was deeply pious, and used the chapel to house his precious relics, which included Christ's crown of thorns and fragments of the True Cross (supposedly). The chapel is acclaimed above all for its stained glass; almost three-quarters of the walls of the soaring space - reaching up to 20 m (65 ft) - are filled with glass, which bathes the chapel in dappled light like a giant magic lantern. |
| 7. Dôme Church of Les Invalides |
| Louis XIV initiated this large, elegant complex of buildings as a hospital for military invalids. Rising above it is its domed church, a majestic space at the heart of which lies the impressive tomb of Napoleon. He died in captivity on the island of Saint Helena in 1821; the British eventually permitted the repatriation of his remains in 1840, and in 1861 they were finally laid to rest beneath the sumptuous dome. The British were wary of the cult of Napoleon, and even today, this tomb - a massive, pristine sarcophagus of red porphyry - and its surroundings inspire a hushed awe. Also buried in the church are various members of Napoleon's family and staff, and other leading French military figures. |
| 8. The Latin Quarter |
| Having moved upmarket in recent decades, the Quartier Latin may no longer have quite the artistic bohemian chic that was once so readily associated with it, but it still retains much of its old character and verve. Historically this lively, tightly populated area of the Left Bank, lying between the Seine and the Jardin du Luxembourg, was the student quarter, focussing on the Sorbonne university, which was founded in 1257; until Napoleonic times, the common language of the area was Latin, hence the name. Wander the network of narrow, cobbled streets; seek out the folksy antique shops and booksellers by the river; shop in the Boulevard Saint-Michel; visit the magnificent collection of medieval art at the Musée de Cluny; people-watch in the famous café-bars on and around the Boulevard St Germain, such as Les Deux Magots and the Café de Flore. Cosmopolitan, stylish, invigorating, the Latin Quarter has all the quintessential flair of Paris. |
| 9. Place des Vosges and the Marais |
| This old patrician quarter of Paris was originally built on marshland (marais), but became the site of strings of grand city mansions, or hôtels, in the 16th to 18th centuries. Visit the Musée Cognacq-Jay in the Hôtel Donon for a snapshot of the exquisite paintings and furniture that accompanied 18th-century high living; or see the layered history of Paris at the Musée Carnavalet in another grand hôtel close by, on the chic shopping street, the Rue des Francs-Bourgeois. The Marais culminates in the Place des Vosges, one of the world's most elegant squares, built in 1605-12, with antique shops, art galleries and cafés lining the arcades, set around a small park. |
| 10. A Cruise on the Seine |
| The River Seine runs through the historic heart of Paris, past the Île Saint Louis and the Île de la Cité, straddled by more than thirty bridges. Take a river trip on one of the many boats (such as the famous Bateaux-Mouches) for a sense of the essential role that the river plays, and to breathe in the magnificent, romantic, theatrical elegance of central Paris - especially when illuminated at night. |
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