Introduction
Begin: Palais Royal-Musée du LouvreEnd: les Grands BoulevardsTime: Approximately two hoursOn this walk, you will begin at the most important social center of the Old Regime and walk to what would become the center of the bourgeois regimes of the nineteenth century: les Grands Boulevards.
#1 Le Louvre des Antiquaires
Begin at the palais Royal-Musée du Louvre métro stop (Line 1). Take the exit place du palais Royal côté rue de Rivoli. As you leave the métro station, you will see the Louvre behind you and a large open square in front of you. To the right is a large building, Le Louvre des Antiquaires.Le Louvre des Antiquaires houses the finest (and most expensive) antique shops in Paris, and, as an added bonus if you’re here in the summer, the entire building is air-conditioned. The items sold here are tightly regulated to assure their authenticity. This is where society’s wealthy shop for antiques. While preparing to write this walk, I saw none other than George Lucas shopping in one of the boutiques. And rest assured, he was not searching for Darth Maul figurines.
#2 Comédie-Française
After window-shopping in the Louvre des Antiquaires, walk to the left of the Conseil d’Etat. Here you will see the southern facade of the Comédie-Française, the most important of France’s national theatres.The Conseil d’Etat, or Council of State is the department of the French national government that acts both as legal adviser to the executive branch and functions as the supreme court in the administrative justice system.Even though it is sometimes called the maison de Molière, Molière never performed here himself (he had a theatre nearby that has since been destroyed). The actors who perform here, however, are Molière’s direct descendants. After the death of Molière in 1673, Louis XIV fused Molière’s troop with the actors from the Hôtel de Bourgogne and called the new group the Comédie-Française. They had several homes until being permanently booked here in 1792. The only way to see the interior is to buy a ticket and see a play (student rates are available).
#3 Palais Royal
Walk between the Comédie-Française and the Conseil d’Etat into the jardin du palais Royal.The palais Royal, originally called the palais Cardinal Richelieu, was built for Louis XIII’s powerful prime minister the Cardinal Richelieu, who gave the palace to the king before he died. The apartments were primarily used to lodge members of the royal family and friends of the court. In the late eighteenth century, with the nobility in serious lack of money, the buildings on the three sides farthest from the Louvre were rebuilt with boutiques and cafés added on the bottom level in order to collect rent. It was at this time that the Comédie-Française was constructed. In the nineteenth century, the palais Royal was home to numerous gaming houses and other houses of ill repute. The palais Royal also became a symbol of the rampant consumerism that characterized the rise of the bourgeoisie following the French Revolution.The double colonnade that cuts across the center of the garden was built during the restoration (1815–30) and encloses the courtyard closest to the cardinal’s original residence, where you will see the controversial black and white sculptures added by artist Daniel Buren in 1986. The kinetic fountains in the center of the colonnade were built in 1985.
#4 Bibliothèque nationale
Continue through the garden to the far end of the park. Be sure to notice the shops under the archways that surround the gardens. Exit through the back left corner. Turn left and cross rue de Montpensier. You are passing by the théâtre du palais Royal, another theatre built in the 1780s that still stages very high quality plays (mostly comedies). Go up the stairs and turn right on rue de Richelieu. (If the gate to the stairs is locked, go back down rue du Beaujolais, take the first left and turn left again. Take a right onto rue de Richelieu.) After crossing rue des Petits Champs, you will notice a large building on your right at 58 rue de Richelieu.This is the Bibliothèque nationale (BnF or French National Library), where most of your French professors researched for their dissertations. Although most of the books were moved to the new Bibliothèque nationale (on rue Tolbiac) in 1998, this site still houses special collections, such as manuscripts, images, photos, maps, music, and coins. The Salle de lecture is worth a look.After going through security at the entrance, head to the right, and enter through the main doors. Look for the door marked Salle de travail. Step inside, and you will see the famous reading room built during the Second French Empire (1852–70).
#5 The Palais de la Bourse
After leaving the library, turn right and continue down rue de Richelieu, turn right on rue des Filles Saint-Thomas and head up to la Bourse, the large building ahead of you.The Palais de la Bourse was the former home of the French Stock Market—France’s equivalent of the New York Stock Exchange on Wall Street. France’s security market is now known as Euronext Paris, following a merge with the Amsterdam, Lisbon, and Brussels exchanges, which took place in 2000. Though you can no longer take a tour, regardless, enjoy the neoclassical architecture and the timeless grace of the building itself.
#6 Passage des Panoramas
For those of you more interested in the consumer side of economics, continue across the square in front of the Bourse (where there is frequently a small market where you may buy everything from clothes to fresh fish) down rue Vivienne, and turn right on rue Saint Marc. At number 10, enter the passage des Panoramas.Covered passages or arcades, like the passage des Panoramas you are in, dot this section of Paris around les Grands Boulevards. The success of the covered storefronts surrounding the palais Royal gardens spawned imitators in the nineteenth century. Small streets covered with glass roofs allowed pedestrians to escape rain and wind and continue shopping in relative comfort. Later, gaslights were added; these early versions of the modern shopping mall stayed open into the evening. Shoppers and flâneurs poured into these areas.The passage des Panoramas, created in 1800, is among the oldest existing covered passages in Paris. Many of the clothing stores that were originally here moved onto les Grands Boulevards, when they were rebuilt in the final third of the nineteenth century. Today, the arcades are primarily lined with small boutiques that buy and sell stamps, old letters, and postcards. You will easily find postcards with postmarks dating from the nineteenth century. In one of the shops, for only a few euros, I bought a letter written during the early days of the French Revolution that still had its wax seal intact. You will notice that many of the shops organize postcards by numbers. These numbers refer to the department number where the photo on the postcard was taken. Paris, for example, is in department number 75; Nice, a city in Southern France, is in a department called Alpes-Maritime, number 6.
The End
Continue through the passage des Panoramas until you come to the boulevard Montmartre, one of the so-called Grands Boulevards. You may continue across to the passage Jouffroy or pause and go into the Musée Grévin, a wax museum named after nineteenth-century caricaturist and sculptor, Alfred Grévin. See wax sculptures of Zinedine Zidane, Brigitte Bardot, Spiderman, Nicolas Sarkozy, and others.When you are ready to head home, go back to boulevard Montmartre. Turn left as you come out of passage Jouffroy or the Wax Museum, and you will see Grands Boulevards métro station.After the WalkBefore returning to the métro, consider ending this walk by eating at La Boule Rouge, one of the best couscous restaurants in Paris. From musée Grévin it is just a short walk to the restaurant, located at 1 rue de la Boule Rouge. If you go for dinner, go early (before 7:00 p.m.) or call ahead and make reservations. You won’t leave hungry.
