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Paris

national capital, France

    

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Paris; Eiffel Tower

Paris; Eiffel Tower

Paris, city and capital of France, situated in the north-central part of the country. People were living on the site of the present-day city, located along the Seine River some 233 miles (375 km) upstream from the river’s mouth on the English Channel (La Manche), by about 7600 BCE. The modern city has spread from the island (the Île de la Cité) and far beyond both banks of the Seine.

Paris

Paris

Paris occupies a central position in the rich agricultural region known as the Paris Basin, and it constitutes one of eight départements of the Île-de-France administrative region. It is by far the country’s most important centre of commerce and culture. Area city, 41 square miles (105 square km); metropolitan area, 890 square miles (2,300 square km). Pop. (2020 est.) city, 2,145,906; (2020 est.) urban agglomeration, 10,858,874.

Character of the city

For centuries Paris has been one of the world’s most important and attractive cities. It is appreciated for the opportunities it offers for business and commerce, for study, for culture, and for entertainment; its gastronomy, haute couture, painting, literature, and intellectual community especially enjoy an enviable reputation. Its sobriquet “the City of Light” (“la Ville Lumière”), earned during the Enlightenment, remains appropriate, for Paris has retained its importance as a centre for education and intellectual pursuits.

Paris’s site at a crossroads of both water and land routes significant not only to France but also to Europe has had a continuing influence on its growth. Under Roman administration, in the 1st century BCE, the original site on the Île de la Cité was designated the capital of the Parisii tribe and territory. The Frankish king Clovis I had taken Paris from the Gauls by 494 CE and later made his capital there. Under Hugh Capet (ruled 987–996) and the Capetian dynasty the preeminence of Paris was firmly established, and Paris became the political and cultural hub as modern France took shape. France has long been a highly centralized country, and Paris has come to be identified with a powerful central state, drawing to itself much of the talent and vitality of the provinces.

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Paris, France

Paris, France

The three main parts of historical Paris are defined by the Seine. At its centre is the Île de la Cité, which is the seat of religious and temporal authority (the word cité connotes the nucleus of the ancient city). The Seine’s Left Bank (Rive Gauche) has traditionally been the seat of intellectual life, and its Right Bank (Rive Droite) contains the heart of the city’s economic life, but the distinctions have become blurred in recent decades. The fusion of all these functions at the centre of France and, later, at the centre of an empire, resulted in a tremendously vital environment. In this environment, however, the emotional and intellectual climate that was created by contending powers often set the stage for great violence in both the social and political arenas—the years 1358, 1382, 1588, 1648, 1789, 1830, 1848, and 1871 being notable for such events.

map of Paris c. 1900

map of Paris c. 1900

In its centuries of growth Paris has for the most part retained the circular shape of the early city. Its boundaries have spread outward to engulf the surrounding towns (bourgs), usually built around monasteries or churches and often the site of a market. From the mid-14th to the mid-16th century, the city’s growth was mainly eastward; since then it has been westward. It comprises 20 arrondissements (municipal districts), each of which has its own mayor, town hall, and particular features. The numbering begins in the heart of Paris and continues in the spiraling shape of a snail shell, ending to the far east. Parisians refer to the arrondissements by number as the first (premier), second (deuxième), third (troisième), and so on. Adaptation to the problems of urbanization—such as immigration, housing, social infrastructure, public utilities, suburban development, and zoning—has produced the vast urban agglomeration.

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Landscape

City site

Paris

Paris

Paris is positioned at the centre of the Île-de-France region, which is crossed by the Seine, Oise, and Marne rivers. The city is ringed with great forests of beech and oak; they are called the “lungs of Paris,” for they help to purify the air in the heavily industrialized region. The city proper is small; no corner is farther than about 6 miles (10 km) from the square in front of Notre-Dame Cathedral. It occupies a depression hollowed out by the Seine, and the surrounding heights have been respected as the limits of the city. Elevation varies from 430 feet (130 metres) at the butte of Montmartre, in the north, to 85 feet (26 metres) in the Grenelle area, in the southwest.

The Seine flows for about 8 miles (13 km) through the centre of the city and 10 of the 20 arrondissements. It enters the city at the southeast corner, flows northwestward, and turns gradually southwestward, eventually leaving Paris at the southwest corner. As a result, what starts out as the stream’s east bank becomes its north bank and ends as the west bank, and the Parisians therefore adopted the simple, unchanging designation of Right Bank and Left Bank (when facing downstream). Specific places, however, are usually indicated by arrondissement or by quarter (quartier).

At water level, some 30 feet (9 metres) below street level, the river is bordered—at least on those portions not transformed into expressways—by cobbled quays graced with trees and shrubs. From street level another line of trees leans toward the water. Between the two levels, the retaining walls, usually made of massive stone blocks, are decorated with the great iron rings once used to moor merchant vessels, and some are pierced by openings left by water gates for old palaces or inspection ports for subways, sewers, and underpasses. At intermittent points the walls are shawled in ivy.

The garden effect of the Seine’s open waters and its tree-lined banks foster in part the appearance of Paris as a city well-endowed with green spaces. Tens of thousands of trees (mostly plane trees, with a scattering of chestnuts) line the streets as well, and numerous public parks, gardens, and squares dot the city. Most of the parks and gardens of the modern central city are on land that formerly was reserved for the kings on the old city’s outskirts. Under Napoleon III, who had been impressed by London’s parks while living in Britain, two ancient royal military preserves at the approaches to Paris were made into “English” parks—the Bois de Boulogne to the west and the Bois de Vincennes to the east. Moreover, during his reign a large area of land was laid out in promenades and garden squares. Under Mayor Jacques Chirac in the late 20th century, the municipal government initiated efforts to create new parks, and such projects continued into the 21st century.

The Promenade Plantée is a partially elevated parkway built along an abandoned rail line and viaduct in the 12th arrondissement (municipal district) of Paris, on the right bank of the Seine River. It was the world’s first elevated park (first phase completed in 1994) and the first “green space” constructed on a viaduct; it has since inspired other cities to turn abandoned rail lines into public parkland. The entire feature runs some 4.5 km (about 3 miles) from the Opéra Bastille to the Bois de Vincennes. Located underneath the elevated portion is the Viaduc des Arts, which stretches along the Avenue Daumesnil. Its former archways house specialized commercial establishments.

Climate of Paris

In its location on the western side of Europe and in a plain relatively close to the sea, Paris benefits from the balmy influences of the Gulf Stream and has a fairly temperate climate. The weather can be very changeable, however, especially in winter and spring, when the wind can be sharp and cold. The annual average temperature is in the lower 50s F (roughly 12 °C); the July average is in the upper 60s F (about 19 °C), and the January average is in the upper 30s F (about 3 °C). The temperature drops below freezing for about a month each year, and snow falls on approximately half of those days. The city has taken measures to decrease air pollution, and a system of water purification has made tap water safe for drinking.

City layout

Over the centuries, as Paris expanded outward from the Île de la Cité, various walls were built to enclose parts of the city. After the Roman town on the Left Bank was sacked by barbarians in the 3rd century CE, the fire-blackened stones were freighted across to the Île de la Cité, where a defensive wall was constructed. Neglected in times of peace, it was rebuilt several times over the course of the centuries. The earliest of the bridges to the Left Bank, the Petit Pont (Little Bridge), which has been rebuilt several times, was guarded by a fortified gate, the Petit Châtelet (châtelet meaning a small castle or fortress). The bridge to the Right Bank, the Pont au Change (Exchange Bridge), was guarded by the Grand Châtelet, which served as a fort, prison, torture chamber, and morgue until it was demolished in 1801.

From 1180 to 1225 King Philip II built a new wall that protected the settlements on both banks. In 1367–70 the Right Bank enclosure was enlarged by Charles V, with the massive Bastille fortress protecting the eastern approaches as the Louvre fortress protected the west. In 1670 Louis XIV had the Charles V walls replaced by the tree-planted Grands Boulevards, embellished at the Saint-Denis Gate (Porte Saint-Denis) and the Saint-Antoine Gate (Porte Saint-Antoine) with triumphal arches; the Saint-Denis arch still stands. (The word boulevard, related to “bulwark,” originally was a military engineering term for the platform of a defensive wall.) Imitating the arch of the river, the Grands Boulevards still stretch from the present-day Place de la Madeleine north and east to the present-day Place de la République.

In the second half of the 18th century, a new wall was begun. The wall was built with 57 tollhouses to enable the farmers-general, a company of tax “farmers,” or collectors, to collect customs duties on goods entering Paris. The tollhouses are still standing at Place Denfert-Rochereau.

The last wall, built in the mid-19th century by Adolphe Thiers for King Louis-Philippe, was a genuine military installation with outlying forts. By the time it was finished, it enclosed a number of hamlets outside Paris, among them Auteuil, Passy, Montmartre, La Villette, and Belleville.

The rebuilding and economic recovery that occurred after the collapse of Napoleon III’s Second Empire in 1870, along with the expansion of employment provoked by the Industrial Revolution, drew more and more people to Paris—with ever-increasing facility as railways developed. Between 1852 and 1870 the city planner Baron Haussmann razed the walls of the farmers-general and built a number of wide, straight boulevards that cut through the city’s mass of narrow streets. The 19th-century walls were eventually knocked down, and the boulevards were extended in 1925.

Today Paris’s many boulevards, old buildings, monuments, gardens, plazas, and bridges compose one of the world’s grandest cityscapes. Much of central Paris was designated a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1991.

Île de la Cité

Pont Neuf

Pont Neuf

Situated in the Seine in the centre of Paris, the ship-shaped Île de la Cité is the historical heart of the city. It is about 10 streets long and 5 wide. Eight bridges link it to the riverbanks, and a ninth leads to the Île Saint-Louis, the smaller island that lies to the southeast. The westernmost bridge is the Pont Neuf (New Bridge), which was built from 1578 to 1604. Despite its name, it is the oldest of the Paris bridges (others predate it but have been rebuilt). Its sturdiness has become axiomatic: Parisians still say that something is “solid as the Pont Neuf.” The bridge, supported in the middle by the tip of the island, extends five arches to the Left Bank and seven to the Right. The parapet corbels are decorated with more than 250 different grotesque masks. The parapet curves out toward the water at each bridge pier, forming half-moon bays along what was the first sidewalk in Paris; in these bays street vendors set up shop. For 200 years this bridge was the main street and the perpetual fair of Paris. Although the structure undergoes regular repair, in the main Pont Neuf as it exists today is the original bridge.

Downstream and just below the bridge, the tip of the Île de la Cité is fashioned into a triangular gravel-pathed park bordered by flowering bushes, with benches under the ancient trees. It is surrounded by a wide cobbled quay that is especially popular with sunbathers and lovers. Where the steps go onto the bridge from the park, there is a bronze equestrian statue of King Henry IV, who insisted on completion of the Pont Neuf. The statue is an 1818 reproduction of the 1614 original, which was the first statue to stand on a public way in Paris. Opposite is the narrow entrance to the Place Dauphine (1607), named for Henry’s heir (le dauphin), the future Louis XIII. The place was formerly a triangle of uniform red-brick houses pointed in white stone, but the row of houses along its base was ripped out in 1871 to make room for construction of part of the Palace of Justice (Palais de Justice).

The palace of the early Roman governor (now the Palace of Justice) was rebuilt on the same site by King Louis IX (St. Louis) in the 13th century and enlarged 100 years later by Philip IV (the Fair), who added the grim gray-turreted Conciergerie, with its impressive Gothic chambers. The Great Hall (Grand Chambre), which, under the kings, was the meeting place of the Parlement (the high court of justice), was known throughout Europe for its Gothic beauty. Fires in 1618 and 1871 destroyed much of the original room, however, and most of the rest of the palace was devastated by flames in 1776. The Great Hall now serves as a waiting room for the various courts of law housed in the Palace of Justice. In the adjoining first Civil Chamber, the Revolutionary Tribunal sat from 1793, condemning some 2,600 persons to the guillotine. After being sentenced, the victims were taken back down the stone stairs to the dungeons of the Conciergerie to await the tumbrels, the carts that carried them to the place of execution. The Conciergerie still stands and is open to visitors.

Paris: Sainte-Chapelle

Paris: Sainte-Chapelle

In the palace courtyards is found one of the great monuments of France, the 13th-century Sainte-Chapelle (Holy Chapel). Built at Louis IX’s direction between 1243 and 1248, it is a masterpiece of Gothic Rayonnant style. With great daring, the architect (possibly Pierre de Montreuil) poised his vaulted ceilings on a trellis of slender columns, the walls between being made of stained glass. The exquisite chapel was designed to hold the Crown of Thorns, thought to be the very one worn by Jesus at his crucifixion. Louis IX had purchased the relic from the Venetians, who held it in pawn from Baldwin II Porphyrogenitus, the Latin emperor of Constantinople (now Istanbul). Other holy relics, such as nails and pieces of wood from the True Cross, were added to the chapel’s collection, the remnants of which are now in the treasury of Notre-Dame.

Under King Louis-Philippe, the “sanitization” of the island was begun in the 19th century, and it was continued for his successor, Napoleon III, by Baron Haussmann. The project involved a mass clearing of antiquated structures, the widening of streets and squares, and the erection of massive new government offices, including parts of the Palace of Justice. The portion of the palace that borders the Quai des Orfèvres—formerly the goldsmiths’ and silversmiths’ quay—became the headquarters of the Paris municipal detective force, the Police Judiciaire (Judicial Police).

Across the boulevard du Palais is the Police Prefecture, another 19th-century structure. On the far side of the prefecture is the Place du Parvis-Notre-Dame, an open space enlarged six times by Haussmann, who also moved the Hôtel-Dieu, the first hospital in Paris, from the riverside to the inland side of the square. Its present buildings date from 1868.

Notre-Dame de Paris

Notre-Dame de Paris

Notre-Dame de Paris

At the eastern end of the Île de la Cité is the cathedral of Notre-Dame de Paris, which is situated on a spot that Parisians have always reserved for the practice of religious rites. The Gallo-Roman boatmen of the cité erected their altar to Jupiter there (it is now in the city’s Museum of the Middle Ages), and, when Christianity was established, a church was built on the temple site. The reputed first bishop of Paris, St. Denis, became its patron saint. The red in the colours of Paris represents the blood of this martyr, who, in popular legend, after decapitation, picked up his head and walked.

When Maurice de Sully became bishop in 1159, he decided to replace the decrepit cathedral of Saint-Étienne and the 6th-century Notre-Dame with a church in the new Gothic style. The style was conceived in France, and a new structural development, the flying buttress, which added to the beauty of the exterior and permitted interior columns to soar to new heights, was introduced in the building of Notre-Dame. Construction began in 1163 and continued until 1345.

gargoyles on the Notre-Dame Cathedral

gargoyles on the Notre-Dame Cathedral

After being damaged during the French Revolution, the church was sold at auction to a building-materials merchant. Napoleon I came to power in time to annul the sale, and he ordered that the edifice be redecorated for his coronation as emperor in 1804. King Louis-Philippe later initiated restoration of the neglected church. The architect Eugène-Emmanuel Viollet-le-Duc worked from 1845 to 1864 to restore the monument.

Notre-Dame de Paris

Notre-Dame de Paris

By the 21st century, prolonged exposure to the weather and decades of damage from acid rain had compromised much of the cathedral’s exterior stonework, and the French government spent millions of euros annually on restoration and maintenance. In April 2019, during one such renovation project, Notre-Dame was ravaged by a fire that destroyed its roof and caused its iconic steeple to collapse. Like all cathedrals in France, Notre-Dame is the property of the state, although its operation as a religious institution is left entirely to the Roman Catholic Church.

A few 16th- and 17th-century buildings survive north of the cathedral. They are what remains of the Cloister of the Cathedral Chapter, whose school was famous long before the new cathedral was built. Early in the 12th century one of its theologians, Peter Abelard, left the cloister with his disciples, crossed to the Left Bank, and set up an independent school in the open air in the Convent of the Paraclete near the present-day Place Maubert. After a prolonged struggle with the monks of Saint-Denis, the followers of Abelard in 1200 won the right, from both the king and the pope, to form and govern their own community. This was the beginning of the University of Paris.

Île Saint-Louis

In 1627 Louis XIII granted a 60-year lease on two mudbanks behind the Île de la Cité to a contractor, Christophe Marie, and two financiers. It was 37 years before Marie was able to unite the islets, dike the circumference, lay out a central avenue with 10 lateral streets, and rent space to householders. The church of Saint-Louis-en-l’Île was begun the same year, 1664, but one of the finest houses, by Louis Le Vau, had been completed as early as 1640. Another, the Hôtel de Lauzun, a few yards upstream on the Quai d’Anjou, was completed in 1657. The Marie Bridge to the Right Bank, which was completed as part of the contract, is the original span, although it has been modified for modern traffic. The Île Saint-Louis constitutes a tranquil neighbourhood in the centre of the busy city.

The Louvre

Louvre Museum

Louvre Museum

On the Right Bank, just north of the western tip of the Île de la Cité, stands the Louvre, one of the world’s largest palaces. Though it was completed only in 1852, it originated in the Middle Ages. Vikings camped on the site during their unsuccessful siege of Paris in 885, and in about 1200 King Philip II had a square crusader’s castle built on the same site, just outside the new city wall, to buttress the western defenses. Over the following centuries many additions and renovations were made, and from the castle grew the present-day palace. From the original square, known as the Cour Carrée (Square Court), two galleries extend westward for about 1,640 feet (500 metres), one along the river and the other along the rue de Rivoli. In 1871, only 19 years after the huge oblong was completed, its western face, the Tuileries Palace (begun 1563), was destroyed by the insurrectionists of the Commune of Paris.

Two of the facades of the Cour Carrée had strong influence on French architecture. Pierre Lescot began his inner courtyard facade in 1546, adapting the Renaissance rhythms and orders he had observed in Italy and adding purely French decoration to the classical motifs. The physician and architect Claude Perrault collaborated with Louis Le Vau, architect to the king, to design the outer east face of the palace in 1673. It too employs classic elements, making especially graceful use of coupled columns and a pediment.

Leonardo da Vinci: Mona Lisa

Leonardo da Vinci: Mona Lisa

The Louvre Museum occupies the four sides of the palace around the Cour Carrée as well as portions of the two galleries. Among the treasures of the museum are the Victory of Samothrace, the Venus de Milo, and the Mona Lisa. The enormous collections contain works spanning at least 26 centuries, with a huge cultural and geographic spread. The north gallery, along the rue de Rivoli, houses a separate museum, the Museum of Decorative Arts (Musée des Arts Décoratifs), as well as the national finance ministry.

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Extensive remodeling has been undertaken throughout the Louvre to increase space for artworks. Construction in the 1980s created a new main entrance and underground reception hall in the vast Napoleon Courtyard, between the two galleries; the large glass pyramid designed by I.M. Pei to cover the entrance aroused both strong support and spirited criticism.

The “Triumphal Way”

Northwest from the Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel (Carrousel Triumphal Arch), located in the courtyard between the open arms of the Louvre, extends one of the most remarkable perspectives to be seen in any modern city. It is sometimes called la Voie Triomphale (“the Triumphal Way”). From the middle of the Carrousel arch, the line of sight runs the length of the Tuileries Gardens, lines up on the obelisk in the Place de la Concorde, and goes up the Avenue des Champs-Élysées (Avenue of the Elysian Fields) to the centre of the city’s famed Arc de Triomphe and beyond to the skyscrapers of La Défense, in the western suburbs.

Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel, Paris

Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel, Paris

Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel, Paris

Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel, Paris

The Louvre’s modest triumphal arch, completed in 1808, stands in the open space where costumed nobles performed in an equestrian display—carrousel—to celebrate the birth of the dauphin (heir to the throne) in 1662. The design of the arch, an imitation of that of the Arch of Septimius Severus in Rome, was conceived by Charles Percier and Pierre Fontaine. The flanks of the Carrousel arch are incised with a record of Napoleon I’s victories.

The Tuileries Gardens (Jardin des Tuileries), which fronted the Tuileries Palace (looted and burned in 1871 during the Commune), have not altered much since André Le Nôtre redesigned them in 1664. Le Nôtre was born and died in the gardener’s cottage in the Tuileries; he succeeded his father there as master gardener. His design carried the line of the central allée beyond the gardens and out into the countryside by tracing a path straight along the wooded hill west of the palace. On this hilltop the famed Arc de Triomphe was completed in 1836.

At the western edge of the gardens, Napoleon III erected a hothouse, known as the Orangerie, and the Jeu de Paume, an indoor court for tennis. Both eventually were adapted as museums: the Orangerie had a small permanent collection, including a group of 19 of Claude Monet’s paintings of water lilies displayed as panoramas; and the Jeu de Paume housed the Louvre’s collection of paintings by the Impressionists and their forerunners. The collections of the two museums—with the exception of the Monet panoramas—were moved to the Orsay Museum (Musée d’Orsay), which opened across the river in 1986, and the Jeu de Paume and the Orangerie were then reserved for occasional exhibitions.

The formal exit gate from the Tuileries is flanked by two winged horses, and the entrance to the Champs-Élysées across the square is similarly adorned, only by earthbound horses. In the 18th century both pairs decorated the grounds of the royal Château de Marly (destroyed during the French Revolution). The original winged-horse sculptures were moved to the Louvre in 1986; replicas now stand in their place.

Paris: Place de la Concorde

Paris: Place de la Concorde

Paris: Luxor Obelisk

Paris: Luxor Obelisk

The Place de la Concorde was designed as a moated octagon in 1755 by Ange-Jacques Gabriel. The river end was left open, and on the inland side two matching buildings were planned. The ground floor was arcaded and the facade nimbly adapted from the Louvre colonnade, all with a refinement typical of the era. Although Gabriel built eight giant pedestals around the periphery of his place, they remained untenanted until the 19th century, when King Louis-Philippe gave them statues representing provincial capitals. Viewed clockwise starting from the Navy Ministry (Ministère de la Marine), the statues symbolize Lille, Strasbourg, Lyon, Marseille, Bordeaux, Nantes, Brest, and Rouen. Louis-Philippe also had the Luxor Obelisk, a gift from Egypt, installed in the centre and flanked by two fountains. Later, the surrounding moat was filled in. King Louis XVI was decapitated on January 21, 1793, near the pedestal that now holds the statue of Brest. Four months later the guillotine was erected near the gates of the Tuileries, and the executions continued there for nearly three years.

Along the first 2,500 feet (750 metres) or so of the Champs-Élysées, between Concorde and the Rond-Point des Champs-Élysées (a roundabout, or traffic circle), the avenue is bordered by gardens. The pavilions in the gardens are used as tearooms, restaurants, and theatres. The Grand Palais (Grand Palace) and the Petit Palais (Little Palace), built for the International Exposition of 1900, sit on the south side of the avenue. The buildings are still used for annual shows and for major visiting art exhibits.

From the Rond-Point up to the Arc de Triomphe, the luxurious town houses that lined the Champs-Élysées in the 19th century were later supplanted by cafés, nightclubs, luxury shops, and cinemas, but the street retained its feeling of luxury, and the tree-shaded sidewalks (as wide as a normal street) offered promenades that were the pride of Paris. Beginning in the 1950s, however, banks, automobile showrooms, airline offices, fast-food eateries, and chain stores (many of them well-known global brands) took over much of the space. Nevertheless, the avenue remains one of the most famous thoroughfares in the world.

Arc de Triomphe, Paris

Arc de Triomphe, Paris

At the top of the Champs-Élysées is a circular place from which 12 imposing avenues radiate to form a star (étoile). It was called Place de l’Étoile from 1753 until 1970, when it was renamed Place Charles de Gaulle. In the centre of the place is the Arc de Triomphe, commissioned by Napoleon I in 1806. It is twice as high and twice as wide as the Arch of Constantine, in Rome, which inspired it. Jean Chalgrin was the architect, and François Rude sculpted the frieze and the spirited group The Departure of the Volunteers of 1792 (called “La Marseillaise”). On Armistice Day in 1920, the Unknown Soldier was buried under the centre of the arch, and each evening the flame of remembrance is rekindled by a different patriotic group.

In the 1970s the largest concentration of tall buildings in Europe arose some 2 miles (3 km) beyond the arch, on the far side of the suburban wedge of Neuilly-sur-Seine. The quarter, called La Défense, was formerly just a place on the road adjoined by the suburban municipalities of Puteaux, Courbevoie, and Nanterre. Today tall office buildings, heated and air-conditioned from a central plant, are the hub of the complex. The “ground level” between buildings is a raised platform reserved for pedestrians, with roads and parking below. There are shops, restaurants, cafés, hotels, and apartment houses. Before the project was begun, the state had already constructed at La Défense its Centre for New Industries and Technologies (Centre des Nouvelles Industries et Technologies; CNIT), a large exhibition hall. The three municipalities later benefited by the acquisition of low-rise public housing in park settings, a large park, day-care centres for children, and new schools. Nanterre also is the site of a branch of the University of Paris.

Around the Eiffel Tower

Back within the city limits, south of Place Charles de Gaulle, is the Chaillot Palace (Palais de Chaillot). Standing on a rise on the Right Bank of the Seine, where the river begins its southwestward curve, the palace is an impressive spot from which to view what is arguably the most recognized symbol of Paris, the Eiffel Tower. The palace, which dates from the International Exposition of 1937, replaced the Trocadéro Palace, a structure left over from the 1878 International Exposition. It is made up of two separate pavilions, from each of which extends a curved wing. Several museums, including the Museum of Mankind, the Naval Museum, the Museum of French Monuments, and the Cinema Museum, are located there. Under the terrace that separates the two sections are the National Theatre of Chaillot and a small hall that serves as a motion-picture house of the national film library.

The terrace, which is lined by statues, gives a splendid view across Paris. The slope descending to the river has been made into a terraced park, the centre of which is alive with fountains, cascades, and pools. The Trocadéro Aquarium (Cinéaqua) is a few steps away in the park. From the bottom of the slope the five-arched Jena Bridge (Pont d’Iéna) leads across the river. It was built for Napoleon I in 1813 to commemorate his victory at the Battle of Jena in 1806.

Eiffel Tower, Paris

Eiffel Tower, Paris

On the Left Bank rises the Eiffel Tower itself, an unclad metal truss tower designed by Gustave Eiffel. The tower was built for the International Exposition of 1889, against the strident opposition of national figures who thought it unsafe or ugly or both. When the exposition concession expired in 1909, the 984-foot (300-metre) tower was to have been demolished, but its value as an antenna for radio transmission saved it. Additions made for television transmission added about 79 feet (24 metres) to the height. From the topmost of the three platforms, the view extends for more than 40 miles (64 km).

Paris: Military Academy

Paris: Military Academy

From the 2-acre (0.8-hectare) base of the tower, the Champ-de-Mars (Field of Mars), an immense field, stretches to the Military Academy (École Militaire), which was built from 1769 to 1772 and later became the site of the War College (École Supérieure de Guerre). The Champ-de-Mars, which originally served as the school’s parade ground, was the scene of two vast rallies during the French Revolution: the Festival of the Federation (1790) and the Festival of the Supreme Being (1794). From 1798 there were annual national expositions of crafts and manufactures, which were followed by world’s fairs between 1855 and 1900.

Behind the Military Academy stands the headquarters of UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization). The building, erected in 1958, was designed by an international trio of architects and decorated by artists of member nations.

The Invalides of Paris

Dôme des Invalides

Dôme des Invalides

One street to the northeast of the Military Academy is the Hôtel des Invalides, founded by King Louis XIV to shelter 7,000 aged or invalid veterans. The enormous range of buildings was completed in five years (1671–76). The gold-plated dome (1675–1706) that rises above the hospital buildings belongs to the church of Saint-Louis. The dome was designed by Jules Hardouin-Mansart, who employed a style known in France as jésuite because it derives from the Jesuits’ first church in Rome, built in 1568. (The churches of the French Academy [Académie Française], the Val-de-Grâce Hospital, and the Sorbonne, as well as three others in Paris, all of the 17th century, also followed this style. By using the classical elements more freely than had been done in Rome, the French made it something recognizably Parisian.)

In the chapels of Saint-Louis are the tombs of Napoleon I’s brothers Joseph and Jérôme, of his son (whose body was returned from Vienna in 1940 by Adolf Hitler), and of the marshals of France. Immediately beneath the cupola is a red porphyry sarcophagus that covers the six coffins, one inside the other, enclosing the remains of Napoleon, which were returned from the island of St. Helena in 1840 through the efforts of King Louis-Philippe. Napoleon’s uniforms, personal arms, and deathbed are displayed in the Army Museum (Musée de l’Armée) at the front of the Invalides. A portion of the Invalides still serves as a military hospital.

Les Invalides, Paris

Les Invalides, Paris

The vast tree-lined Invalides Esplanade slopes gently to the Quai d’Orsay and the Alexandre III Bridge. The first stone for the bridge, which commemorates the Russian tsar Alexander III, was laid in 1897 by Alexander’s son, Tsar Nicholas II. The bridge was finished in time for the International Exposition of 1900, and it leads to two other souvenirs of that year’s fair, the Grand Palais and the Petit Palais.

The ministry quarter

Running along the river from the Eiffel Tower to the Carrousel Bridge is an area of the Left Bank known as the ministry quarter. Most of the national ministries are located there, along with the headquarters of the Île-de-France region and the National Assembly (Assemblée Nationale). The arrondissement is the old Faubourg Saint-Germain, an impeccable address since the early 18th century. As such, it was subject to heavy expropriation during the French Revolution, and ministries are lodged mostly in splendid old mansions and convents. Although imposing, these have been difficult to adapt to the needs of modern administration. When it has proved impractical to spread into adjacent buildings or to construct annexes in the garden, branches have been installed wherever space can be found. Some of the ministries occupy as many as 25 separate buildings.

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Probably the best known of all ministries is the low-built, ornate Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Ministère des Affaires Étrangères), on the Quai d’Orsay between the Invalides Esplanade and the National Assembly. The address “Quai d’Orsay” has become a synonym for the ministry.

The National Assembly is housed in the Bourbon Palace (1722–28), which was seized during the Revolution. Succeeding regimes added bits and pieces onto the old palace, including the Greek peristyle facing the river as ordered in 1807 by Napoleon I.

Musée d'Orsay: atrium

Musée d'Orsay: atrium

The old, disused Orsay railway station near the river was renovated and in 1986 was reopened as the Orsay Museum (Musée d’Orsay) of 19th-century art and civilization. It contains, among other collections, the Impressionist and Postimpressionist paintings—by Paul Cézanne, Édouard Manet, Claude Monet, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Vincent van Gogh, and others—that were formerly in the Jeu de Paume.

The Institute of France

East of the Orsay Museum, at the point where the Arts Bridge (Pont des Arts) meets the Left Bank, stands the Institute of France (Institut de France), which since 1806 has housed the five French academies. The site was originally occupied by the Nesle Tower (Tour de Nesle), a defense work for the Left Bank terminus of the city wall of 1220. Louis Le Vau designed the additional buildings in 1663 to house the College of the Four Nations (Collège des Quatre-Nations), paid for by a legacy from Louis XIV’s minister Cardinal Mazarin, who had brought the four entities in question—Pignerol (Pinerolo, in the Italian Piedmont), Alsace, Artois, and northern Catalonia (the Cerdagne [Cerdaña] and Roussillon regions)—under the French crown. Le Vau based his designs on Italian models. The five contemporary academies are the French Academy, founded by Cardinal de Richelieu in 1635, which edits the official French dictionary, awards literary prizes, and has a membership of “40 Immortals”; the Academy of Inscriptions and Belles Lettres, founded in 1663 by Louis XIV’s finance minister, Jean-Baptiste Colbert; the Academy of Sciences, founded in 1666, also by Colbert; the Academy of Fine Arts, two sections formed at different times by Mazarin and Colbert and joined in 1795; and the Academy of Ethics and Political Science, created by the National Convention (a governing body during the French Revolution) in 1795 to ponder questions of philosophy, economics, politics, law, and history.

Almost next door is the Mint (Hôtel des Monnaies). In this sober late 18th-century building, visitors may tour a museum of coins and medals.

The Arts Bridge leads from the Institute of France across the Seine to the Louvre. One of the most charming of all the Parisian bridges, it was the first (1803) to be made of iron, and it has always been reserved for pedestrians; it provides an intimate view of riverside Paris and of the Seine itself.

Saint-Germain-des-Prés and the Latin Quarter

South of the city centre are the quintessential Left Bank neighbourhoods known as Saint-Germain-des-Prés and the Latin Quarter (Quartier Latin). The boulevard Saint-Germain itself begins at the National Assembly building, curving eastward to join the river again at the Sully Bridge. A little less than halfway along the boulevard is the pre-Gothic church of Saint-Germain-des-Prés. The old church, which belonged to a Benedictine abbey founded in the 8th century, was sacked four times by Vikings and was rebuilt between 990 and 1201. Parts of the present church date from that time.

This portion of the Left Bank has long been a gathering place for practitioners of the arts. The dramatist Jean Racine died there in 1699; the painter Eugène Delacroix had his studio in the Place Fürstemberg; publishing houses moved in during the 19th century; and the principal cafés have been meeting places for artists, writers, and publishers ever since. From 1945 to about 1955 it was the hub of the Existentialist movement and an associated revival of bohemianism. It is still a lively centre for literature, food, and conversation.

Straight north from the crossroads at the Saint-Germain-des-Prés church is the National School of Fine Arts (École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts), the state school of painting and sculpture, on the Quai Malaquais. Two streets south of the crossroads is the church of Saint-Sulpice (1646–1780), the work of six successive architects. The street alongside the church is sprinkled with shops specializing in devotional statuary, much of it on the aesthetic level of tourist souvenirs and known in France as “Saint Sulpicerie.” Eastward to the boulevard Saint-Michel, the area toward the river from the boulevard Saint-Germain is a tangle of narrow, animated streets, which typify the tourist’s idea of a vivacious and noisy Paris.

La Dame à la licorne

La Dame à la licorne

East of the boulevard Saint-Michel is the university precinct, self-governing under the kings, where, in class and out, students and teachers spoke Latin until 1789 (hence the name Quartier Latin). At the junction of the boulevards Saint-Germain and Saint-Michel are the remains of one of the three baths of the Roman city. These are in the grounds of the National Museum of the Middle Ages (Musée National du Moyen Âge), housed in the Hôtel de Cluny, a Gothic mansion (1485–1500) that holds a collection of medieval works of art, including the renowned six-panel tapestry La Dame à la licorne (“The Lady and the Unicorn”).

The wide straight boulevard Saint-Michel is the main street of the student quarter. It is lined with bookshops, cafés, cafeterias, and movie houses. The buildings of the university are found on smaller streets. The university was built up of colleges, each founded and supported by a donor, often a prelate or a religious order. In about 1257 Robert de Sorbon, chaplain to Louis IX, established a college, known as the Sorbonne, that eventually became the centre of theological study in France. The oldest part of the Sorbonne is the chapel (1635–42), the gift of Cardinal de Richelieu, who is buried there. It was designed by Jacques Lemercier and was one of a number of new domed Jesuit-style churches of the period.

The Sorbonne served for centuries as the administrative seat of the University of Paris. Following mass student protests in 1968, the university was divided into a number of entirely separate universities, and the Sorbonne building proper continues to serve as the premises for some of these. Other faculties, schools, and institutes have moved to more-spacious sites in the city and suburbs in an effort to ease the overcrowding of the Paris student milieu.

The independent College of France (Collège de France) was set up a few steps from the university by King Francis I in 1529 to offer a more liberal, modern curriculum than the narrow theology and Latin of the Sorbonne. Bestowing no degrees, it always has had a superb faculty of well-known specialists, especially in philosophy, literature, and the sciences.

At the top of the hill rising from the river, the boulevard Saint-Michel skirts the Luxembourg Gardens, the remains of the park of Marie de Médicis’ Luxembourg Palace (1616–21), which now houses the French Senate. The gardens are planted with chestnuts and are enhanced with a pond for toy sailboats, a marionette theatre, and statuary.

East of the gardens at the end of the rue Soufflot stands the 18th-century Panthéon building, designed by Jacques-Germain Soufflot. It was commissioned by King Louis XV, after his recovery from an illness, as a votive offering to St. Geneviève and was to replace the mouldering 5th-century abbey in her name. Though intended as the principal church in Paris, it was renamed the Panthéon by the Revolutionary authorities, who made it the last resting place for heroes of the French Revolution. The walling up of a number of its windows and the removal of much interior decoration replaced the intended effect of a light interior space with a gloomy dignity. Among those buried under the inscription “Aux grands hommes, la Patrie reconnaissante” (“To great men, [from] their grateful homeland”) are the authors Voltaire, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Victor Hugo, and Émile Zola, as well as Jean Moulin, chief of the Resistance in World War II.

Northwest of the Panthéon is a steep street named the rue de la Montagne Sainte-Geneviève. It was the paved road to Italy in Roman times. The hill leads down to the lively market square of Place Maubert and a tangle of ancient, picturesque riverside streets. The best known of these is the medieval rue de la Huchette, from which the rue du Chat-qui-Pêche (“Street of the Fishing Cat”) leads to the Quai Saint-Michel. Two churches in this area—Saint-Séverin (1489–94), Gothic and humble, and Saint-Julien-le-Pauvre (1165–1220), which belongs to the transitional period between the Romanesque and the Gothic—are notable. The square in front of the latter church offers one of the finest views of Notre-Dame de Paris.

The Rue de Rivoli and Right Bank environs

North of the city centre, a few streets away from the Seine and running roughly parallel to the river, is the rue de Rivoli. At its eastern end the street fronts the Hôtel de Ville and the Saint-Jacques bell tower (Tour Saint-Jacques), all that remains of a church in the Flamboyant Gothic style that was torn down in 1797. Farther west, the Louvre and the Tuileries Gardens occupy a long stretch of land between the street and the river. On the north side of the street is an arcade more than 1 mile (1.6 km) long.

Palais-Royal, Paris

Palais-Royal, Paris

Comédie-Française

Comédie-Française

Opposite the middle of the Louvre, the Place du Palais-Royal leads to the palace of Cardinal de Richelieu, which he willed to the royal family. Louis XIV lived there as a child, and during the minority of Louis XV the kingdom was ruled from there by the debauched regent Philippe II, duc d’Orléans, from 1715 to 1723. Late in the 18th century Louis-Philippe-Joseph, duc d’Orléans, who was popularly renamed Philippe-Egalité during the French Revolution for his radical opinions, undertook extensive building around the palace garden. It was a commercial operation, and the prince hoped to pay his debts from the property rents. Around the garden he built a beautiful oblong of colonnaded galleries and at each end of the gallery farthest from his residence a theatre. The larger playhouse has been the home of the Comédie-Française, the state theatre company, since Napoleon I’s reign. The princely apartments now shelter high state bodies such as the Conseil d’État (Council of State).

The Parisian city planner Baron Haussmann greatly enlarged the Place du Palais-Royal in 1852, and he was careful to preserve the palace when he laid out the avenue de l’Opéra. At the top of this avenue, a grand opera house was built from 1825 to 1898. The Paris Opera House (l’Opéra, or Palais Garnier), a splendid monument to the Second Empire, was designed in the neo-Baroque style by Charles Garnier. It is known especially for its decorative embellishments, chief among them the Grand Staircase. Just behind the Opera House are various large department stores.

The next place along the rue de Rivoli is the Place des Pyramides. The gilded equestrian statue of Joan of Arc stands not far from where she was wounded at the Saint-Honoré Gate (Porte Saint-Honoré) in her unsuccessful attack on Paris (at that time held by the English), on September 8, 1429.

Farther west, toward the Place de la Concorde, the rue de Castiglione leads from the rue de Rivoli to the Place Vendôme, an elegant octagonal place, little changed from the 1698 designs of Jules Hardouin-Mansart. In the centre, the Vendôme Column bears a statue of Napoleon I. It was pulled down during the Commune of 1871 and put back up under the Third Republic (1871–1940). The Place Vendôme and the adjacent rue de la Paix, which enters the place opposite the rue de Castiglione, have lost none of their discreet distinction, nor have their shops.

La Madeleine

La Madeleine

Take a trip to the Élysée Palace and learn about its rich history

Take a trip to the Élysée Palace and learn about its rich historySee all videos for this article

The rue de Rivoli ends at the Place de la Concorde. Between the twin buildings on the northeastern side of the place, the broad rue Royale mounts to the Madeleine, consecrated in 1842. This church is a stern oblong, fenced with columns approximately 65 feet (20 metres) high. Its design, supposedly that of a Greek temple, is actually closer to the Roman notion of Greek architecture. To the west off the rue Royale runs the rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré. In addition to the British embassy and the Élysée Palace (residence of the French president), it has on its shop windows some of the most prestigious names in the Paris fashion trade.

At the Place de la Madeleine begin the Grands Boulevards, which arch eastward through the Right Bank to the Place de la République. The glittering chic of these contiguous boulevards—Madeleine, Capucines, Italiens, Montmartre, Poissonnière, Bonne Nouvelle, Saint-Denis, and Saint-Martin—flavoured Paris life from the 1750s to the 1880s. Many of this epoch’s theatres and other entertainments survive. The Opéra Comique stands fast just off the boulevard des Italiens; the Grévin wax museum survives on the boulevard Montmartre; and, a few doors away, the Théâtre des Variétés, founded under the Second Empire by the composer Jacques Offenbach, still operates. The Théâtre de la Renaissance, where the actor Benoît-Constant Coquelin created the role of Cyrano de Bergerac in 1897, remains on the boulevard Saint-Martin. The Théâtre de l’Ambigu, where Frédéric Lemaître, the celebrated actor in boulevard melodrama, thrilled all Paris in the mid-19th century, was demolished in the 1960s.

The Hôtel de Ville

Back in the city centre, the Hôtel de Ville (City Hall) is situated on the Right Bank, just across from the eastern end of the Île de la Cité. It contains the official apartments of the mayor of Paris. Three city halls have stood on the site of the present building, each grander than its predecessor. The first was the House of Pillars (Maison aux Piliers), used by the municipality from 1357 to 1533. The present-day Hôtel de Ville (1874–82) replaced the Renaissance structure that was in use from the 16th century until 1871, when it was burned by the insurrectionary Communards.

The first two buildings sat on the Place de Grève (grève meaning “strand” or “bank”), which was the principal port of Paris for centuries. (The refusal of boatmen to work gave the French their phrase for going on strike: faire la grève.) The name of this square was changed in 1830 to Place de l’Hôtel de Ville. From 1310 to 1832 it was Paris’s principal place of execution.

The second Hôtel de Ville was the focus of numerous popular uprisings, including the revolutions of 1789, 1830, and 1848 and the Commune of Paris of 1871. The current building played a prominent role during the liberation of the city from German occupation in 1944.

In July 1789, already having taken the Invalides and the Bastille, the Revolutionary mob captured the Hôtel de Ville. Three days afterward Louis XVI appeared on the balcony wearing a tricolour cockade (blue, white, and red; a symbol of the Revolution) and was cheered by the crowd. The building later was taken as headquarters for the city’s Revolutionary government (the Paris Commune of 1792), which directed mob action to control the National Convention, the governing assembly of France at the time. On July 27, 1794, the Convention’s guards entered the Hôtel de Ville and seized the radical leader Maximilien de Robespierre and his followers; all were executed soon after. Following the July Revolution of 1830, the new king Louis-Philippe appeared on the Hôtel de Ville’s balcony and was acclaimed by the revolutionary crowd.

In 1871, after Napoleon III’s defeat at Sedan during the Franco-German War, a new French republic was declared from the steps of the Hôtel de Ville; however, when the national government in its turn capitulated, Parisians refused to accept defeat and in March formed the Commune of Paris. In May national troops entered the city and fought sharp engagements with the Communards, who set fire to the Hôtel de Ville, the Tuileries Palace, the Palace of Justice, the Police Prefecture, the Arsenal, and other government buildings. Approximately 20,000 Parisians were killed during the fighting.

In 1944, as the city was being liberated from the Germans, the National Council of Resistance (Conseil National de la Résistance) made the Hôtel de Ville its headquarters. At the climax of the liberation, Gen. Charles de Gaulle appeared on the balcony and was acclaimed by the crowd.

The Bastille

The road off the upper end of the Île Saint-Louis leads to the Place de la Bastille on the Right Bank. From the river to the place runs a canal, the Arsenal Basin, which formerly supplied water to the moat around the Bastille fortress. At the Place de la Bastille the waterway goes underground for almost 1 mile (1.6 km) and then emerges to form the Saint-Martin Canal, which, with its bridges and locks and its barges sailing slowly down the centre of city streets, constitutes one of the least-known and most picturesque sections of Paris.

storming of the Bastille

storming of the Bastille

The Bastille was used as a state prison from the 17th century. Its capture by a mob on July 14, 1789, during the early years of the French Revolution, was a symbolic blow at tyranny rather than an act of liberation for tyranny’s victims. The prison had been virtually unused for years and was scheduled for demolition by the monarchy; it held on that day only four counterfeiters, two madmen, and a young aristocrat who had displeased his father. The Bastille was demolished after its capture.

The future emperor Napoleon I had the place laid out in 1803. A railway station was built there in 1859. The station was razed in 1984 to allow construction of a new opera house, the Opéra Bastille (inaugurated 1989).

The neighbourhood between the Bastille and the Place de la Nation, eastward along the rue du Faubourg Saint-Antoine, has been one of skilled craftsmen since the mid-15th century, when the self-governing royal abbey gave space within its wide domains to those cabinetmakers who refused to abide by the restrictions of Paris guilds as to styles and types of wood to be used. This neighbourhood was always among the first to revolt when revolution was in the air and was noted for the speed with which it raised barricades of impressive height. The character of the area has changed, however, as most of the small workshops have closed.

The Marais

To the west of the Bastille lies a triangular area with its base along the river up to the Hôtel de Ville and its apex just short of the Place de la République to the north. It keeps its name—le marais (“the marsh”)—from the Middle Ages, and, because it became the market garden of Paris, it gave its name to all market gardening (la culture maraîchère; also called truck farming, or the production of vegetables for the market) in France.

Extension of the city walls along the Right Bank led to diking of the shore and drainage of the soil. In 1107 the Knights Templar established Le Temple, a vast fortified enclosure, at the top of the triangle. In 1360 the future king Charles V moved into his new royal residence in the lower right-hand corner, where the rue des Lions marks the former location of the menageries.

King Charles VII preferred to live just behind the Bastille, in the Hôtel des Tournelles, which Henry II had had enlarged and beautified by Philibert Delorme in 1550. Great nobles, such as the dukes of Guise and Lorraine, followed the king and had palaces built in the vicinity. When Henry II was killed in a joust on the rue Saint-Antoine in 1559, his widow, Catherine de Médicis, had the Tournelles razed. On the site in 1607 construction began on the first residential square to be designed in Paris. Henry IV reserved a house there for himself. The three-story houses are made of red brick with white-stone quoins (solid-corner angles) and window surrounds, and the ground floors form arcades over the sidewalks. The square was named Place Royale, but since 1800 it has been called Place des Vosges. Another wave of building by the rich, eager to be close to a royal project, endowed the Marais with 200 more private palaces.

In 1792 the Hospitallers (also known as the Knights of Malta) were turned out of Le Temple, which had been given to them in 1313 when the Templar order was dissolved. The temple became state property, and in August 1792 the royal family was incarcerated in the temple’s tower keep. Louis XVI was taken off to his death on January 21, 1793, and Queen Marie-Antoinette was removed to the Conciergerie that August (and executed on October 16). The temple’s tower was leveled in 1808 to discourage rallies there by royalists.

After the 17th-century construction boom the Marais remained virtually untouched. Toward the end of the 19th century, while some of the oldest and most imposing of the palaces were being demolished by private developers, other owners managed to restore a few mansions, and the French and Parisian governments also restored a handful of fine buildings. However, as many Jewish refugees from eastern Europe settled in the district, scores of houses were subdivided into tiny apartments for the poverty-stricken newcomers, and workshops were installed on the lower floors and in courtyard sheds. The Marais gradually became one of the worst slums in Paris.

Hôtel de Soubise, Paris

Hôtel de Soubise, Paris

In 1969 the municipal council approved an urban renewal scheme for ending slum conditions while preserving the workaday life and animation and restoring the undeniable beauty of the quarter. The scheme was very successful, and property prices in the Marais have soared. Among the restored ancient buildings open to the public are the Museum of the History of Paris (Hôtel de Carnavalet), built in 1545 and enlarged by François Mansart in 1645; the Museum of the History of France (National Archives, Hôtel de Soubise), parts of which date from 1375, 1553, and 1704–15; the Museum of Hunting and Nature (Hôtel de Guénégaud des Brosses), built by Mansart in 1648–51; the National Bureau of Historic Monuments (Hôtel de Sully), by Jean I Androuet du Cerceau (see du Cerceau family); and the Picasso Museum (Hôtel Salé).

Closer to the Hôtel de Ville is the Gothic Hôtel de Sens, built at the end of the 15th century for the bishops of Sens, then also bishops of Paris. It was restored after 40 years of work and now serves as a city library of specialized collections. Nearby, behind facades of a much later date, two half-timbered medieval houses have been uncovered. Portions of the 13th-century city wall, including one of the watchtowers, still may be seen in the quarter as well.

On the western fringe of the Marais is the Georges Pompidou National Centre for Art and Culture, popularly called Centre Pompidou, a vast glass-and-metal structure of distinctive design inaugurated in 1977. It soon proved its popularity and remains a successful attraction for Parisians and tourists alike. The centre houses the National Museum of Modern Art, temporary exhibits, the multimedia Public Reference Library, the Industrial Design Centre, the Institute for Acoustic and Musical Research, and workshops for children.

The Halles of Paris

Several streets northwest of the Hôtel de Ville is the quarter of the Halles, which was from 1183 to 1969 the central market (ultimately a wholesale market for fresh products) of Paris. When the market moved out to a new location at Rungis, near the Paris-Orly airport, the quarter’s distinctive 19th-century iron-and-glass market halls (10 originals, designed by Victor Baltard and built between 1854 and 1866, and two 1936 reproductions) and their neighbourhood were designated for renewal. The renewal projects were delayed for several years, however, by bitter disagreements over how the area should be used. The old market halls were used temporarily for exhibitions and cultural events, but in 1971 they were torn down. Their demolition left an enormous hole in the ground that became a symbol to many Parisians of the end of an era. Construction at the site began in 1971, and in 1977 a station linking the city’s subway system (the Métro) with the regional express system was opened. The Forum des Halles, a partly subterranean multistoried commercial and shopping centre, was opened in 1979, and the nearby streets were converted to a traffic-free zone for pedestrians. The Forum never became popular, however, and many complained about the area’s preponderance of fast-food restaurants and illicit drug dealers. In the early 21st century the city planned to renovate the site once again.

A few of the neighbourhood’s old houses were renovated or restored to keep some of the old flavour. The church of Saint-Eustache (1532–1637) remains, as does the circular Grain Exchange (Halle au Blé; 1811–13), which was burned by the Commune of 1871 and restored in the 1880s as the Commercial Exchange (Bourse de Commerce).

The Buttes

The river valley of Paris is almost entirely circled by high ground. Upon the heights of Passy, on the Right Bank between the western city limits and the Arc de Triomphe, perch the wealthy neighbourhoods of the 16th arrondissement. By contrast, the Butte-Montmartre (18th arrondissement) and the Buttes-Chaumont (19th arrondissement), which rise along the northern rim of the city, are historically working-class areas that have attracted a significant population of immigrants.

Montmartre district, Paris

Montmartre district, Paris

From the early 19th century until the migration in the 1920s to Montparnasse, Montmartre was the major art colony of Paris. Some sections are highly commercialized for the tourist trade; others, however, contain unself-consciously picturesque features—such as the neighbourhood’s winding lanes, some of which become stairways on the steeper hills. Montmartre also is known for its nightclubs and entertainment.

The most noted landmark of Montmartre was built only in 1919: the Sacred Heart Basilica (Basilique du Sacré-Coeur), paid for by national subscription after the French defeat by the Prussians in 1870, during the Franco-German War. The work began in 1876 but was delayed by the death of the architect, Paul Abadie, who took inspiration from the 12th-century five-domed Romanesque church of Saint-Front in Périgueux, itself inspired by either Venetian or Byzantine churches. Alongside the monumental terraced stairway of the garden-planted Square Willette below the church entrance runs the only funicular railway in Paris.

On the northeastern edge of the city proper, at La Villette in the 19th arrondissement, the giant structure of the old city abattoirs, out of use since 1974, was reopened in 1986 as a science museum (Cité des Sciences et de l’Industrie). Nearby are a spherical panoramic cinema building (La Géode) and a large leisure park and culture complex.

On the Buttes-Chaumont just to the east of Montmartre is the Buttes-Chaumont Park, which was created under the city planner Baron Haussmann in 1864–67. A bare hill, half hollowed out by abandoned tunnel quarries and filled with the refuse of generations, was turned into a romantic landscape with a lake, a waterfall, a grotto, winding woodland paths, and picturesque bridges. It is the largest public park within Paris.

Père-Lachaise Cemetery

Père-Lachaise Cemetery

This portion of the 19th arrondissement is known as Belleville, a formerly independent village that stretches south into the 20th arrondissement. The 20th also is home to the Ménilmontant neighbourhood and Père-Lachaise Cemetery—the site of the Federalists’ Wall (Mur des Fédérés), against which the last of the fighters of the Commune of Paris were shot in 1871. The cemetery is both the largest park and the largest cemetery in Paris and is a major tourist attraction, renowned for its tombs of notable figures and often hailed as the most-visited cemetery in the world. Among the famous people buried there are Peter Abelard and Héloïse, Molière, Eugène Delacroix, Jacques-Louis David, Georges Bizet, Frédéric Chopin, Honoré de Balzac, Marcel Proust, Georges Seurat, Oscar Wilde, Sarah Bernhardt, Isadora Duncan, Gertrude Stein, Colette, Edith Piaf, Marcel Marceau, Richard Wright, and Yves Montand, among others. One of the most frequently visited grave sites is that of rock star Jim Morrison (lead singer of the Doors), who died in 1971 at age 27. In addition to flowers, fans have left burning candles, wine and liquor bottles, and drug paraphernalia at his headstone. Vandals, fans, and souvenir hunters have stripped the site of mementos and statues, held parties at his grave site, and even tried to remove his body.

Modern business quarters

As a counterbalance to the march of office buildings westward to La Défense and beyond, and as part of the effort to limit the obliteration of residential quarters around the business centre of the city, other “poles of attraction” were instituted in several parts of Paris, beginning in the late 1960s. Two of these are directly on the waterfront at each end of Paris: Front de Seine (“Seine Waterfront”) in the southwest corner and Austerlitz-Bercy-Lyon in the southeast corner. Another, Maine-Montparnasse, is located in south-central Paris.

The Front de Seine is on the Left Bank, between the Eiffel Tower and the southern city limits. Here a neighbourhood of factories and substandard housing was replaced by a spread of high-rise buildings used for offices and apartments.

The business quarter straddling the opposite end of the river features office buildings around the Austerlitz (Left Bank) and the Lyon (Right Bank) railroad stations. Bercy, which lies directly on the river on the Right Bank, was until this development one of the “secret cities” of Paris. This was the village of vintages, where merchants stored and sold their stocks of wine. Fenced and guarded, its chalets lined cobbled lanes named for the great vineyard districts of France. The great oaks, it was said, flourished because their roots were soaked in wine. The Bercy area, redeveloped on a large scale, now has many large office blocks and a sports and entertainment arena.

The centrepiece of the Maine-Montparnasse district is a 59-story office tower on the site of the old Montparnasse railway station. A more compact station was built one street away on the avenue du Maine, where the rails are hidden on three sides by buildings 15 to 18 stories high. The units are joined by a raised platform that serves as a “ground level” above the street.

Blake Ehrlich

John Anthony Charles Ardagh

Kimberly Daul

People of Paris

In 1850 Paris had approximately 600,000 inhabitants. It then grew rapidly as industrial expansion attracted a constant stream of people from the provinces. By 1870 the population had surpassed 1,000,000, and by 1931 the conurbation contained some 5,000,000 people, more than half of them living in the city of Paris, the administrative city within the old gates. After World War II this growth continued, and in the early 21st century Greater Paris had over 10,000,000 inhabitants. The population of the city of Paris, however, steadily declined, from a peak of about 2,900,000 in 1931 to roughly 2,200,000 in 2012, so that about four out of five Parisians were suburbanites. The shift took place in part because massive rehousing reduced the city’s high density, though it remained well above the northern European average. Many families moved out to newer and more spacious homes in the smaller towns around the capital, leaving the city of Paris with an aging, curiously solitary population, with almost half of the households consisting of just one person. Yet within the first few years of the 21st century, the city’s population slowly began to increase. With birth rates rising and older persons tending to retire outside the capital region, the Parisian population also grew younger.

Paris-born Parisians are outnumbered by those born outside the city, many of whom keep their provincial or international ties. Hence, many shops, restaurants, and neighbourhoods have a French regional or international flavour. While most nonnative Parisians are French, more than one-tenth of the population is foreign-born. About a third of the city’s foreign residents are from European Union member countries, but the largest immigrant groups are peoples of African origin—particularly Muslim Arabs from the North African countries of Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia. In general, families of North African origin cluster in the poorer northern quarters or, increasingly, in the peripheral banlieues (suburbs) surrounding the capital. In the late 20th and early 21st centuries, high unemployment and low social mobility fed racial and religious tensions in the banlieues.

Those tensions boiled over in October 2005 when two teenagers were accidentally electrocuted while hiding from police in an electricity substation in Clichy-sous-Bois, a banlieue northeast of Paris. The rioting by ethnic minorities that followed dispelled the belief held by many French people that their country had been exemplary in terms of the integration of people of different religions and ethnicities. Over three weeks the unrest spread from the satellite towns around Paris to much of the rest of the country. Discrimination and lack of opportunity in France’s heavily immigrant suburbs fueled the protests, which peaked on the night of November 7, affecting 274 communes around the country. The following day Pres. Jacques Chirac declared a state of emergency. It was not until November 17, after nearly 9,000 cars had been burned and nearly 3,000 arrests made, that the French police declared that the level of car burning had returned to “normal.” The state of emergency was not lifted until February 2006.

The city’s sizable black population is made up of immigrants from the French overseas departments of Martinique and Guadeloupe as well as from West and Central African countries such as Senegal, Mali, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Many of these immigrants inhabit the northeastern portions of Paris, as do people of Chinese and Turkish origin. Immigrant groups from Southeast Asia are concentrated in southeastern Paris.

Most of the population is nominally Roman Catholic, though only a small percentage attend Mass regularly. Muslims are an important presence in the city, as evidenced by its dozens of mosques, including the Grande Mosquée de Paris (1922–26) in the 5th arrondissement. The Jewish community is centred on the rue des Rosiers quarter of the Marais neighbourhood, where there are numerous synagogues, kosher stores, and Hebrew bookshops.

Economy

Paris is not only the political and cultural capital of France but also its major financial and commercial centre. Despite some pockets of poverty, it is a very wealthy city, home to many vast private fortunes, both French and foreign. It serves as the base for numerous international business concerns, and even if large French firms have their manufacturing plants in the provinces, they nearly all keep their headquarters in Paris, conveniently close to the major banks and key ministries. Greater Paris does still contain a significant portion of French manufacturing concerns, but as an industrial centre the Île-de-France region is less dominant in France than it was in its heyday in the 1930s. Today more than four-fifths of the region’s workforce is employed in the services sector, notably in business services and public- and private-sector administration and commerce. This proportion is even higher in the city of Paris itself. As a whole, the region is characterized by an above-average concentration of senior management and administrative and research personnel.

Manufacturing

It was largely because it was already the political capital, with firms thus attracted to it, that Paris became an actively industrial city in the 19th century. Unlike other older French industrial areas, such as Lorraine and Nord-Pas-de-Calais, it was not near mineral resources. But it did have some natural assets of its own, notably the Seine River, which is still used for barge traffic moving principally between the capital and the downstream ports of Rouen and Le Havre. Traditional industries were devoted mainly to handicrafts and luxury goods, but, when the growth of railways and canals in the 19th century made the northern coalfields more accessible, heavier industries began to develop. These soon spread beyond the city into the new industrial suburbs. To the northwest, along the Seine’s loop from Suresnes to Gennevilliers, armaments factories, heavy engineering works, and chemical plants were created, and automobile and aircraft factories eventually were established in the Seine valley toward Rouen.

More recently, manufacturing has developed principally in the capital’s outer ring, particularly in strategic sites such as the area around the Roissy–Charles de Gaulle airport (northeast of Paris) or newer suburban towns. The nature of industry also has changed. Many traditional activities, such as metallurgy, food processing, and printing, progressively disappeared, while electronics, telecommunications, and other high-technology industries gained emphasis. These have become located preferentially in a broad arc to the southwest of Paris, stretching from Versailles southeast to Évry.

For much of the period between 1950 and 1980, the policy of successive French governments was to limit the industrial growth of the Paris region in favour of the provinces. The policy also was used to effect a better distribution of industry within the region, with the aim of favouring the development of new towns. The idea of restraining industry in Paris itself had lost currency by the end of the 20th century, however, as the central and inner areas of the capital already had been largely deindustrialized. Nevertheless, the city of Paris is still the home of many small-scale but typically Parisian activities: haute couture, notably on the avenue Montaigne and the rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré; the clothing industry, in the Sentier quarter; jewelry, in the Place Vendôme and the rue de la Paix; and furniture making, in the Faubourg Saint-Antoine.

Finance and other services

Paris: Stock Exchange

Paris: Stock Exchange

The major French banks, insurance companies, and other financial bodies are all centred in Paris, predominantly in the main financial quarter on the Right Bank around the Stock Exchange (Palais de la Bourse) and the central offices of the Banque de France. Scores of foreign multiservice banks also have branches in Paris. In 2000 the Paris Stock Exchange merged with the Amsterdam and Brussels exchanges to form the Euronext equities market, which in turn merged with the New York Stock Exchange in 2006.

After World War II, Paris developed greatly as a centre for international business and commerce, especially in the new skyscraper quarter of La Défense (just west of the city, in the Hauts-de-Seine département), where many large company headquarters are situated. The centre of the capital also houses many businesses, as do numerous other towns in Hauts-de-Seine and the rest of the Île-de-France region. In addition, Paris is one of the world’s most popular sites for international business conferences. It has several major modern convention centres, notably the Palais des Congrès at the Maillot Gate (Porte Maillot), as well as important exhibition facilities, including those at Villepinte in the northern suburbs.

It was the French who invented the modern department store (grand magasin), with the opening of the Bon Marché on the Left Bank in the 19th century. Other quintessential grands magasins, such as Printemps and Galeries Lafayette, are found on the Right Bank. Numerous shopping centres also have been built in various central and suburban locations. In the 1960s the major food and wine wholesale markets were transferred from their central locations at the Halles on the Right Bank and the Halle aux Vins (the wine market) on the Left Bank to new and more spacious homes in the suburbs.

Transportation of Paris

The Paris public transport system, operated by a body that is largely state-controlled, has been modernized and extended since the early 1970s. The underground rail network is now regarded as being among the finest of the world’s major cities. Trains on the principal lines of the Métropolitain (Métro) subway system, first opened in 1900, are fast and frequent. Over many years, lines have been extended into the suburbs, and in 1998 a new, fully automatic line was opened to serve central areas of the city. The Réseau Express Régional (RER), a high-speed express subway system comprising cross-Paris routes, extends far into the suburbs, and at some points its lines have been integrated with the main-line railway network. The hub of the system is Châtelet–Les-Halles, said to be the world’s largest and busiest underground station. The city’s transport system also features an extensive bus service and tram lines.

Improvements in public transport have been part of official campaigns to ease traffic problems by discouraging the daily use of automobiles for commuting. Nevertheless, the volume of traffic remains high, and congestion is widespread. A riverside expressway (Voie Georges Pompidou) runs along the Right Bank, and another expressway, the boulevard périphérique, encircles the city. This expressway is linked with suburban and national highways, of which Paris is the hub.

Paris: Gare de Lyon

Paris: Gare de Lyon

Similarly, the large Paris railway terminals serve the French railway network, first built in the 19th century. High-speed trains (trains à grande vitesse; TGV) link the capital with most parts of France; they also run from Paris to London, via the Channel Tunnel, and to neighbouring countries on the Continent.

The main international airport is Roissy–Charles de Gaulle, to the northeast; the older Orly airport, to the south, is used mainly for domestic and charter flights. The Seine River carries barges and pleasure traffic; there are commercial ports both upstream and downstream from the city.

Administration and society

Government

A sharp distinction is drawn between city administration and suburban administration. The city of Paris is a single political unit—a commune—governed by an elected mayor and council, like any other French commune down to the smallest village. The suburbs consist of more than 1,200 separate communes, large and small, which together with the city of Paris form the administrative region of Île-de-France. The Île-de-France region, with an area of about 4,640 square miles (12,000 square km), extends far beyond the Paris conurbation. The urban area of Greater Paris is therefore not a political unit, and coordination is frequently poor between Paris and its inner suburbs. Because of the fierce rivalries between left-wing and right-wing communes, it has never been possible to follow the pattern of other major world cities and create a federated urban district.

Île-de-France is the most populous of France’s 22 regions. The region consists of eight départements: Hauts-de-Seine, Seine-Saint-Denis, Val-de-Marne, Essonne, Yvelines, Val-d’Oise, Seine-et-Marne, and Paris. Under the socialist government’s devolutionary reforms of 1982–86, Île-de-France, like the other regions, was given a certain degree of autonomy. It has a directly elected assembly with a chairman and executive; it can raise its own taxes; and it has responsibility for adult education and for some aspects of culture, tourism, road building, planning, and aid for industrial development. The directly elected representatives of the eight départements also have been given increased responsibilities: they run the welfare and social services, involving large budgets, as well as controlling some matters concerning the infrastructure. The communes in turn look after their own town planning and building. Each département is supervised by a state-appointed prefect and Île-de-France by a regional prefect.

The city of Paris itself has a curious history of local government. The municipal Council of Paris (Conseil de Paris) is elected by the people every six years. From 1871 to 1977 the council had no mayor and was controlled directly by the departmental prefect, so that Paris had less autonomy than any village. The national government, worried by memories of the uprisings of 1789 (the French Revolution), 1848 (the Revolution of 1848), and 1871 (the Commune of Paris), wanted to keep power from the Paris populace. A statute passed in 1975, however, permitted the councillors once again to elect their own mayor. The mayor now has the same status and powers as mayors in other French towns. The first mayoral election was held in 1977. In 1982 a ward system was introduced, whereby each of the 20 arrondissements was given its own mayor and local council. In practice, however, real control remains in the hands of Paris’s mayor.

Municipal services

The city’s telephone services and electricity and gas utilities are run by national concerns. The state operates the fire departments and the police, which are part of the Police Nationale. In addition to dealing with crime, traffic, and public order, the Paris police register vehicles and drivers; issue passports, identity cards, and aliens’ residence permits; and conduct political surveillance. Combating terrorism became a particular concern in the 21st century in the wake of a deadly assault on the satiric magazine Charlie Hebdo and the November 13, 2015, attacks. Special police agencies include detective and counterespionage services and the State Security Police (Compagnies Républicaines de Sécurité), used for dispersing demonstrations. The Republican Guard (Garde Républicaine), a mounted squadron of spurred, helmeted, plumed, and breast-plated guardsmen armed with sabres, is used for ceremonial occasions such as visits by foreign heads of state.

Health

The public hospitals and hospital groups in Paris are run jointly by the city and the national health ministry and are financed largely by a social welfare system. Some other hospitals are run by churches and by private organizations, and there are numerous private clinics. Of the city’s many medical research bodies, the best known is the Pasteur Institute, founded in 1887.

Education of Paris

As in the rest of France, schools are largely in the hands of the state and are of three main kinds: primary, junior secondary (collèges), and senior secondary (lycées). A significant minority of all pupils are in private, nonstate schools, most of them run by the Roman Catholic Church. Some of the best-known lycées in central Paris are the Lycée Henri-IV, the Lycée Louis-le-Grand, and the Lycée Janson de Sailly; such schools traditionally have educated a large number of the nation’s intelligentsia.

Paris has long been an important world centre of higher education. The building known as the Sorbonne housed the arts and science faculties of the University of Paris, one of Europe’s oldest universities, until it was split into 13 autonomous universities following mass student protests in 1968. A number of much smaller bodies of higher education—more specialized and more elitist than the Universities of Paris—include the engineering, technical, and business colleges known as the grand schools (grandes écoles). The two best known in the Paris region are the School of Higher Business Studies (École des Hautes Études Commerciales; HEC) and the Polytechnical School (École Polytechnique). The Normal Superior School (École Normale Supérieure) serves mainly to prepare future university and lycée teachers. The Institute of Political Sciences (Institut des Sciences Politiques; “Sciences Po”) nurtures many of those who go on to the influential postgraduate National School for Administration (École Nationale d’Administration; ENA) to train as senior civil servants. This selective structure has served France well in many ways but also has come under heavy criticism and undergone sporadic reform.

Cultural life

Paris has for centuries been regarded as the main cultural powerhouse of the Western world, a magnet for artists and intellectuals and a place where new ideas originate and art reigns supreme. This notion was especially true in the early part of the 20th century, when the city was favoured by numerous expatriate writers and artists, including Ernest Hemingway from the United States, James Joyce from Ireland, Pablo Picasso from Spain, and Amedeo Modigliani from Italy.

While some critics have maintained that Parisian culture has become more a matter of show and dazzle than of true creativity, the city’s cultural life is still highly active and distinctive. Parisians love novelty, have an abounding intellectual curiosity, know how to dress up the simplest cultural event with flair and elegance, and are avid patrons of the arts, so the theatres and concert halls, museums, art galleries, and art cinemas are always well attended.

The principal state-run theatres are the Comédie-Française, the Odéon Theatre, and the National Theatre of Chaillot, which offer a repertoire of French classics, serious modern plays, and foreign imports. Lighter fare is provided by the many privately owned “boulevard” theatres, which struggle to survive. There are more than 150 smaller theatres, many of them state supported, which present a mixed program of experimental “fringe” shows, cabaret, and the like. In addition to many multiscreen commercial cinemas, there are scores of little “art” houses that show a wide variety of movies, many of them with subtitles. France’s main film studios are in the suburbs of Paris.

While the Louvre is the greatest of the classic art museums, newer major museums include the National Museum of Modern Art in the Pompidou Centre, the Orsay Museum of 19th-century art and civilization, and the science museum at La Villette. A specialty of Paris is the staging of large and lavishly mounted exhibitions, usually retrospectives of an individual artist or historical period.

The city’s musical life, once moribund, became much livelier after the early 1970s, in part because the state provided much-needed funding. The city also renewed its commitment to opera by opening a second opera house, at the Place de la Bastille, in 1989. Major annual festivals emphasizing music and drama include the Music Festival (Fête de la Musique), held in June, and the Autumn Festival (Festival d’Automne), held from mid-September through December.

The main publishing houses and bookshops are located in the Latin Quarter and Saint-Germain-des-Prés neighbourhoods. The best-known daily newspaper is Le Monde, followed by the daily Le Figaro and Libération. Among the widely read weekly newsmagazines are L’Express and Le Point. The satiric weekly Charlie Hebdo long had a reputation of skewering political and religious figures, and its relatively low circulation numbers belied its cultural influence. Its depiction of the Prophet Muhammad drew a violent response from Islamist militants—the magazine was firebombed in 2011, and a deadly shooting in January 2015 claimed the lives of 11 journalists and security personnel, including editor Stéphane (“Charb”) Charbonnier. All the main French national radio and television networks are centred in Paris; some are owned by the state, and some are privately owned.

John Anthony Charles Ardagh

History

Foundation and early growth (c. 7600 BCE to 12th century CE)

The earliest evidence for human habitation in what is now the city of Paris dates from about 7600 BCE. By the end of the 3rd century BCE, a settlement had been built on the Île de la Cité; it was inhabited by a Gallic tribe known as the Parisii. The first recorded name for the settlement was Lutetia (Latin: “Midwater-Dwelling”). When the Romans arrived, the Parisii were sufficiently organized and wealthy to have their own gold coinage. Julius Caesar wrote in his Commentaries (52 BCE) that the inhabitants burned their town rather than surrender it to the Romans. In the 1st century CE Lutetia grew as a Roman town and spread to the left bank of the Seine. The straight streets and the public buildings in this locale were characteristically Roman, including a forum, several baths, and an amphitheatre.

A series of barbarian invasions began in the late 2nd century. The town on the left bank was destroyed by the mid-3rd century, and the inhabitants took refuge on the island, around which they built a thick stone wall. From the early 4th century the place became known as Paris.

By this time, Christianity seems to have spread to Paris. A 10th-century sacramentary cites St. Denis (Latin Dionysius) as having been the first bishop of Paris, about 250 CE. A graveyard excavated near the Carrefour des Gobelins shows that there was a Christian community in very early times on the banks of the Bièvre (a left-bank tributary of the Seine); but it was probably under St. Marcel, the ninth bishop (c. 360–436), that the first Christian church, a wooden structure, was built on the island.

By the end of the 5th century, the Salian Franks, under Clovis, had captured Paris from the Gauls, making it their own capital. It remained the capital until the end of Chilperic’s reign in 584, but succeeding Merovingians carried the crown elsewhere. Charlemagne’s dynasty, the Carolingians, tended to leave the city in the charge of the counts of Paris, who in many cases had less control over administration than did the bishops. After the election of Hugh Capet, a count of Paris, to the throne in 987, Paris, as a Capetian capital, became more important.

The population and commerce of Paris increased with the gradual return of political stability and public order under the Capetian kings. The maintenance of order was entrusted to a representative of the king, the provost of Paris (prévôt de Paris), first mentioned in 1050. In the 11th century the first guilds were formed, among them the butchers’ guild and the river-merchants’ guild, or marchandise de l’eau. In 1141 the crown sold the principal port (near the Hôtel de Ville) to the marchandise, whose ship-blazoned arms eventually were adopted as those of Paris. In 1171 Louis VII gave the marchandise a charter confirming its “ancient right” to a monopoly of river trade.

Medieval development and discord (12th century to 16th century)

During the reign of Philip II (1179–1223), Paris was extensively improved. Streets were paved, the city wall was enlarged, and a number of new towns were enfranchised. In 1190, when Philip II went on a crusade for a year, he entrusted the city’s administration not to the provost but to the guild. In 1220 the crown ceded one of its own precious rights to the townsmen—the right to collect duty on incoming goods. The merchants were also made responsible for maintaining fair weights and measures. The King’s formal recognition of the University of Paris in 1200 was also a recognition of the natural division of Paris into three parts. On the Right Bank were the mercantile quarters, on the island was the cité, and the Left Bank contained the university and academic quarters. Numerous colleges were also founded, including the Sorbonne (about 1257).

In the 14th century the development of Paris was hindered not only by the Black Death (1348–49) but also by the Hundred Years’ War (1337–1453) and by internal disturbances resulting from it. The provost of the merchants in 1356 was Étienne Marcel, who wanted a Paris as rich and free as the independent cities of the Low Countries. He gave the House of Pillars to the municipal government, and he slew the Dauphin’s counselors in the palace throne room and took over the city. Marcel showed great executive skill and equally great political stupidity and allied himself with the revolting peasants (the Jacquerie), with the invading English, and with Charles the Bad, the ambitious king of Navarre. While going to open the city gates to the Navarrese in 1358, Marcel was slain by the citizens.

In 1382 a tax riot grew into a revolt called the “Maillotin uprising.” The rioters, armed with mauls (maillets), were ruthlessly put down, and the municipal function was suspended for the next 79 years. It was not until 1533, when Francis I ordered the teetering House of Pillars replaced by a new building, that a monarch manifested an encouraging interest in municipal government.

The dynastic and political vendetta between the Burgundian and the Armagnac faction (1407–35) had continual repercussions in Paris, where the butchers and skinners, led by Simon Caboche, momentarily seized power (1413). The resumption of the Hundred Years’ War by the English in 1415 made matters worse. After a revolt of the Parisians (1418), the Burgundians occupied Paris; the Anglo-Burgundian Alliance (1419) was followed by the installation of John Plantagenet, duke of Bedford, as regent of France for the English king Henry VI (1422). Whereas Charles VI had lived in his father’s Hôtel Saint-Paul, Bedford lived in the Hôtel des Tournelles, on the southeastern edge of the Marais, which was to be the Paris residence of later kings until 1559. During the reign of Charles VI, construction began on the Notre-Dame Bridge (1413).

In 1429 Joan of Arc failed to capture Paris. Only in 1436 did it fall to the legitimists, who welcomed Charles VII in person in 1437. Successive disturbances had reduced the population, but the Anglo-French truce of 1444 allowed Charles to begin restoring prosperity.

In 1469, during Louis XI’s reign (1461–83), the Sorbonne installed the first printing press in Paris. Otherwise this was a period of intellectual stagnation. Churches were rehabilitated and new houses were built, however; from 1480 splendid private mansions began to appear, such as the Hôtel de Sens and the Hôtel de Cluny.

From Renaissance architecture to beautification schemes (15th century to 18th century)

The influence of the Italian Renaissance on town architecture appeared in the new building for the accounting office and in the reconstruction of the Notre-Dame Bridge (1500–10) in Louis XII’s reign. Under Francis I (1515–47) this influence grew stronger, finding notable expression in the new Hôtel de Ville. Furthermore, whereas from Charles VII’s time the kings of France had preferred to reside in Touraine, Francis returned the chief seat of royalty to Paris. With this in mind he had extensive alterations made to the Louvre from 1528 onward. The new splendour of the monarchy, which was well on its way toward absolute rule, was reflected in the way Paris developed as the capital of an increasingly centralized state. The population increased and the town expanded again. Rigorous measures were taken to stamp out Protestantism, which first appeared in Paris during Francis I’s reign.

The Renaissance in Paris culminated with Henry II, who made his solemn entry into the capital in 1549. The new impulse given to building mansions for the nobility and bourgeoisie began to transform Paris from a medieval to a modern city. In 1548 the Brothers of the Passion began performing secular plays at the Hôtel de Bourgogne, in the rue Française, thus inaugurating the first theatre in Paris.

The transfer of the royal residence from the Hôtel des Tournelles to the Louvre, signaling the development of the neglected western outskirts of Paris, was completed after Henry II’s death in 1559. Catherine de Médicis began to build the Tuileries Palace, the gardens of which became a meeting place for elegant society. Classical taste was brilliantly exemplified by the Pont-Neuf, begun in 1577.

In the mid-16th century the Wars of Religion broke out in France between Roman Catholics and Huguenots, which in Paris brought about the Massacre of St. Bartholomew’s Day (1572); the Day of the Barricades (1588), when the Catholic League rose against Henry III; and the long resistance of the Parisians to the Protestant Henry of Navarre, who succeeded as Henry IV in 1589. Henry IV’s siege in 1590 was unsuccessful, and only after his conversion to Catholicism did Paris submit to him (1594).

In Louis XIII’s reign (1610–43) Paris expanded farther. On the Left Bank, outside the wall, the queen mother, Marie de Médicis, built the Luxembourg Palace, with its spacious gardens; along the Right Bank, west of the Tuileries, she laid out the Cours-la-Reine as a promenade for carriages. While the Marais north of the Place Royale was being reclaimed and developed, two uninhabited islets east of the cité were united to form the Île Saint-Louis. On the western fringe of the town, a quarter with straight streets was laid out north of Richelieu’s new palace, the Palais-Cardinal (1624–36; later the Palais-Royal), which also had a magnificent garden; west of this there was more building and a new fortification was erected.

The war of the Fronde (1648–53) was the major event of the first two decades of Louis XIV’s reign. From 1661, when Cardinal Mazarin died and Louis started his personal rule, Paris was dedicated to reflecting the glory of the monarch, even though he was early resolved to establish himself and the seat of his government outside of Paris (he chose Versailles). For the planning of the new splendours of Paris, the greatest part of the credit must go to Jean-Baptiste Colbert, the king’s superintendent of buildings.

Work on the Louvre had been resumed in 1624 and was completed by Claude Perrault’s magnificent colonnade (1667–74). The Tuileries Palace was altered and sumptuously decorated. Beyond its gardens to the west, outside the walls of Paris, the tree-planted avenues of the Champs-Élysées were laid out (1667); these were complemented, at the opposite end of Paris, by the Cours de Vincennes.

In 1702 the Marquis d’Argenson (Marc René de Voyer), who as lieutenant general of police succeeded the provosts of Paris, raised the number of districts from 16 to 20 (15 on the Right Bank, five on the Left). Paris had nearly 600,000 people, and from the Left Bank new suburbs were advancing toward the villages on the surrounding hills.

During the 18th century a great deal was done to improve and beautify Paris. Louis XV’s temporary residence in the Tuileries during his younger days encouraged development nearby, so that the Faubourg Saint-Honoré expanded and became, like the Faubourg Saint-Germain, an aristocratic quarter. The garden of the Palais-Royal became a centre of elegant society. The Grands Boulevards began to be bordered with houses, including some fine mansions, and the eastern stretch became a fashionable promenade with little theatres and cafés. Villas built by nobles and financiers were scattered around this outlying sector. On the Left Bank the southern course of boulevards was laid out and the routes were lined with trees and houses. Some of the houses that had been built earlier on the bridges were razed in 1786–88; others remained until 1808. Water was supplied to both banks by two fire pumps, developed by Jacques-Constantin Périer and his father, Auguste-Charles. The wall of the farmers-general, built in the 1780s to facilitate the levying of duties on imports, represented the extension and the unity of Paris.

Paris during and after the French Revolution (1789 to mid-19th century)

The French Revolution of 1789 destroyed those vestiges of the seigneurial systems that had remained in Paris and consolidated the status of Paris as the capital of a centralized France. The major events of the Revolution took place in Paris, including the storming of the Bastille (July 14, 1789); the conveying of the King and the National Constituent Assembly from Versailles to Paris (October 1789); the establishment of the numerous clubs in the convents of the old religious orders, Jacobins, Cordeliers, and Feuillants; the insurrection that heralded the abolition of the monarchy (August 10, 1792); the execution of the King (January 21, 1793) in the Place de la Révolution, not yet named Place de la Concorde; the most prolonged manifestation of the Terror (1793–94); and the series of coups d’état, from that of 9 Thermidor, year II (1794), to that of 18 Brumaire, year VIII (1799), which preceded the ascendancy of Napoleon Bonaparte.

Under the Thermidorians and the Directory the boulevard des Italiens became a resort of the fashionable and the frivolous, whereas the populace favoured the boulevard du Temple. After the inauguration of the First Empire, Napoleon in 1806 ordered the triumphal arches of the Carrousel and of the Étoile to be erected. While the Neoclassical style recalled imperial Rome, great works of public utility served to modernize Paris: the Bourse; new quays and bridges (the Arts, Jena, Austerlitz, and Saint-Louis bridges); the Ourcq and Saint-Martin canals; numerous fountains (such as the Palmier Fountain, on the site of the Châtelet); as well as slaughterhouses, marketplaces, the wine market, and the warehouses of Bercy.

Industrialization, in progress in the Napoleonic period, advanced rapidly under the Restoration (1814–30) and the July Monarchy (1830–48). Gas lighting was introduced; omnibus services began in 1828; and Paris got its first railway, which ran to Le Pecq, near Saint-Germain-en-Laye, in 1837. New districts grew up on the outskirts of Paris. Although the wall of the farmers-general remained the administrative boundary of Paris until 1859, it was decided in 1840 to refortify the capital with a longer military wall.

Even by the mid-19th century, some areas of Paris had not been improved substantially for hundreds of years. Access from one centre to another and to the railway stations (which had become in effect the gateways of Paris) was difficult; moreover, overpopulation and rapid industrialization had brought squalor and misery, which account in part for the dominant role of Paris in the revolutions of both 1830 and 1848.

Haussmann’s Paris (mid-19th century to 1968)

Paris

Paris

Napoleon III, emperor from 1852 to 1870, enjoined his prefect of the Seine, Baron Haussmann, to remedy these problems. Haussmann was the creator of modern Paris. A planner on the grand scale, he advocated straight arterial thoroughfares, symmetry, and advantageous vistas. He slashed the boulevards through the tangles of slums, began the modern sewer and water systems, gutted the Île de la Cité, rebuilt the ancient market of the Halles, and added four new Seine bridges and rebuilt three old ones. The brilliance and prosperity of Paris under Napoleon III were exemplified in the exhibitions held there in 1855 and 1867.

The Franco-German War (1870–71), which brought the fall of the Second Empire and the siege of Paris, was followed by the Commune (1871). Under the Third Republic, Haussmann’s projects were continued. Further international exhibitions (1878, 1889, 1900, and 1937) were the occasions for the building of monuments such as the Trocadéro (1878), the Eiffel Tower (1889), and the Grand Palais and Petit Palais, with the Alexandre III Bridge (1900), and for the reconstruction of the Trocadéro as the Chaillot Palace (1937). The Métro was constructed, commerce and industry annexed formerly residential districts, and the ever-expanding population overflowed the old limits of Paris. Louis-Philippe’s fortifications were abolished by a law of April 1919.

German occupation of Paris

German occupation of Paris

During the German occupation of Paris in World War II, the city was only slightly damaged. It was a centre for the activities of the Resistance movement, which culminated in the liberation of the city in August 1944.

The immediate postwar years were a time of eager intellectual activity but also of poverty and social tension. The housing shortage was grave, the psychological scars of the German occupation were slow to heal, and colonial wars and political instability lowered morale. Conditions gradually improved, especially after Charles de Gaulle returned to power in 1958. The city’s economy improved, old buildings and neighbourhoods were cleaned up and renovated, and housing and commercial space were built.

The city of grands projets (1968 to 21st century)

In May 1968 Paris was rocked by a great student uprising, which swelled from scattered unrest among students in the Latin Quarter to a nationwide outbreak of labour strikes and protests. Attention was focused on Paris’s economic and social problems, and the uprising was later seen as useful in hastening the modernization of French society.

During the last decades of the 20th century, several new developments bolstered the cultural and economic position of Paris. These included the architecturally innovative Pompidou Centre (or Beaubourg) and the Orsay Museum. Commercial projects included the office complexes at Bercy, at La Villette, and at La Défense, a high-rise business district on the periphery of the city. The latter’s Grande Arche de la Défense, a monumental rectangular arch completed in 1989, echoes the Arc de Triomphe to its east. This arch was one of the architectural grands projets (“great projects”) promoted by Pres. Franƈois Mitterrand to symbolize French cultural and economic leadership. Other such projects included the glass pyramid at the Louvre and the French National Library (Bibliothèque nationale de France), which was completed in 1995.

During the late 20th century, Paris attracted thousands of migrants from Africa, the Middle East, the Caribbean region, and other parts of Europe. They contributed to the city’s economy and cultural diversity, but high unemployment and limited social and economic mobility in the cités—massive housing projects that were home to a large portion of the immigrant community—fueled frustration that sometimes led to violence. In October 2005 riots swept the Paris suburbs before spreading to the rest of the country, and weeks passed before order could be restored. Concerns about the potential radicalization of Muslim youth in the banlieues (suburbs) increased in the wake of a series of Islamist terrorist attacks in 2015. The assault on the satiric magazine Charlie Hebdo in January united the country under the slogan “Je suis Charlie” (“I am Charlie”), but a much deadlier wave of attacks in November of that year led French Pres. François Hollande to declare that the country was “at war.” At least 130 people were killed in Europe’s bloodiest terrorist attack since the 2004 Madrid train bombings, and officials in Paris struggled to find a balance between security and liberty. Despite those challenges, the increasingly cosmopolitan character of Paris reinforced its place as one of the great metropolises of the world.

Eiffel Tower

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Coordinates: 48°51′29.6″N 2°17′40.2″E

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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This article is about the landmark in Paris, France. For other uses, see Eiffel Tower (disambiguation).

"300-metre tower" and "Tour Eiffel" redirect here. For other tall towers, see List of tallest towers. For other uses, see Tour Eiffel (disambiguation).

Eiffel Tower

Tour Eiffel (French)

Seen from the Champ de Mars

Map

Wikimedia | © OpenStreetMap

Record height

Tallest in the world from 1889 to 1930[I]

General information

Type Observation tower

Broadcasting tower

Location 7th arrondissement, Paris, France

Coordinates 48°51′29.6″N 2°17′40.2″E

Construction started 28 January 1887; 136 years ago

Completed 15 March 1889; 134 years ago

Opening 31 March 1889; 134 years ago

Owner City of Paris, France

Management Société d'Exploitation de la Tour Eiffel (SETE)

Height

Architectural 300 m (984 ft)[1]

Tip 330 m (1,083 ft)

Top floor 276 m (906 ft)[1]

Technical details

Floor count 3[2]

Lifts/elevators 8[2]

Design and construction

Architect(s) Stephen Sauvestre

Structural engineer Maurice Koechlin

Émile Nouguier

Main contractor Compagnie des Etablissements Eiffel

Website

toureiffel.paris/en

References

I. ^ "Eiffel Tower". Emporis. Archived from the original on 22 April 2016.

UNESCO World Heritage Site

Part of Paris, Banks of the Seine

Criteria Cultural: i, ii, iv

Reference 600

Inscription 1991 (15th Session)

The Eiffel Tower (/ˈaɪfəl/ EYE-fəl; French: Tour Eiffel [tuʁ ɛfɛl] ⓘ) is a wrought-iron lattice tower on the Champ de Mars in Paris, France. It is named after the engineer Gustave Eiffel, whose company designed and built the tower from 1887 to 1889.

Locally nicknamed "La dame de fer" (French for "Iron Lady"), it was constructed as the centerpiece of the 1889 World's Fair. Although initially criticised by some of France's leading artists and intellectuals for its design, it has since become a global cultural icon of France and one of the most recognisable structures in the world.[3] The tower received 5,889,000 visitors in 2022.[4] The Eiffel Tower is the most visited monument with an entrance fee in the world:[5] 6.91 million people ascended it in 2015. It was designated a monument historique in 1964, and was named part of a UNESCO World Heritage Site ("Paris, Banks of the Seine") in 1991.[6]

The tower is 330 metres (1,083 ft) tall,[7] about the same height as an 81-storey building, and the tallest structure in Paris. Its base is square, measuring 125 metres (410 ft) on each side. During its construction, the Eiffel Tower surpassed the Washington Monument to become the tallest human-made structure in the world, a title it held for 41 years until the Chrysler Building in New York City was finished in 1930. It was the first structure in the world to surpass both the 200-metre and 300-metre mark in height. Due to the addition of a broadcasting aerial at the top of the tower in 1957, it is now taller than the Chrysler Building by 5.2 metres (17 ft). Excluding transmitters, the Eiffel Tower is the second tallest free-standing structure in France after the Millau Viaduct.

The tower has three levels for visitors, with restaurants on the first and second levels. The top level's upper platform is 276 m (906 ft) above the ground – the highest observation deck accessible to the public in the European Union. Tickets can be purchased to ascend by stairs or lift to the first and second levels. The climb from ground level to the first level is over 300 steps, as is the climb from the first level to the second, making the entire ascent a 600 step climb. Although there is a staircase to the top level, it is usually accessible only by lift. On this top, third level is a private apartment built for Gustave Eiffel's private use. He decorated it with furniture by Jean Lachaise and invited friends such as Thomas Edison.

History

Origin

The design of the Eiffel Tower is attributed to Maurice Koechlin and Émile Nouguier, two senior engineers working for the Compagnie des Établissements Eiffel. It was envisioned after discussion about a suitable centerpiece for the proposed 1889 Exposition Universelle, a world's fair to celebrate the centennial of the French Revolution. Eiffel openly acknowledged that inspiration for a tower came from the Latting Observatory built in New York City in 1853.[8] In May 1884, working at home, Koechlin made a sketch of their idea, described by him as "a great pylon, consisting of four lattice girders standing apart at the base and coming together at the top, joined together by metal trusses at regular intervals".[9] Eiffel initially showed little enthusiasm, but he did approve further study, and the two engineers then asked Stephen Sauvestre, the head of the company's architectural department, to contribute to the design. Sauvestre added decorative arches to the base of the tower, a glass pavilion to the first level, and other embellishments.

First drawing of the Eiffel Tower by Maurice Koechlin including size comparison with other Parisian landmarks such as Notre Dame de Paris, the Statue of Liberty, and the Vendôme Column

The new version gained Eiffel's support: he bought the rights to the patent on the design which Koechlin, Nougier, and Sauvestre had taken out, and the design was put on display at the Exhibition of Decorative Arts in the autumn of 1884 under the company name. On 30 March 1885, Eiffel presented his plans to the Société des Ingénieurs Civils; after discussing the technical problems and emphasising the practical uses of the tower, he finished his talk by saying the tower would symbolise

    [n]ot only the art of the modern engineer, but also the century of Industry and Science in which we are living, and for which the way was prepared by the great scientific movement of the eighteenth century and by the Revolution of 1789, to which this monument will be built as an expression of France's gratitude.[10]

Little progress was made until 1886, when Jules Grévy was re-elected as president of France and Édouard Lockroy was appointed as minister for trade. A budget for the exposition was passed and, on 1 May, Lockroy announced an alteration to the terms of the open competition being held for a centrepiece to the exposition, which effectively made the selection of Eiffel's design a foregone conclusion, as entries had to include a study for a 300 m (980 ft) four-sided metal tower on the Champ de Mars.[10] (A 300-metre tower was then considered a herculean engineering effort). On 12 May, a commission was set up to examine Eiffel's scheme and its rivals, which, a month later, decided that all the proposals except Eiffel's were either impractical or lacking in details.

After some debate about the exact location of the tower, a contract was signed on 8 January 1887. Eiffel signed it acting in his own capacity rather than as the representative of his company, the contract granting him 1.5 million francs toward the construction costs: less than a quarter of the estimated 6.5 million francs. Eiffel was to receive all income from the commercial exploitation of the tower during the exhibition and for the next 20 years. He later established a separate company to manage the tower, putting up half the necessary capital himself.[11]

A French bank, the Crédit Industriel et Commercial (CIC), helped finance the construction of the Eiffel Tower. During the period of the tower's construction, the CIC was acquiring funds from predatory loans to the National Bank of Haiti, some of which went towards the financing of the tower. These loans were connected to an indemnity controversy which saw France force Haiti's government to financially compensate French slaveowners for lost income as a result of the Haitian Revolution, and required Haiti to pay the CIC and its partner nearly half of all taxes collected on exports, "effectively choking off the nation's primary source of income". According to The New York Times, "[at] a time when the [CIC] was helping finance one of the world's best-known landmarks, the Eiffel Tower, as a monument to French liberty, it was choking Haiti's economy, taking much of the young nation's income back to Paris and impairing its ability to start schools, hospitals and the other building blocks of an independent country."[12]

Artists' protest

Caricature of Gustave Eiffel comparing the Eiffel tower to the Pyramids, published in Le Temps, 14 February 1887.

The proposed tower had been a subject of controversy, drawing criticism from those who did not believe it was feasible and those who objected on artistic grounds. Prior to the Eiffel Tower's construction, no structure had ever been constructed to a height of 300 m, or even 200 m for that matter,[13] and many people believed it was impossible. These objections were an expression of a long-standing debate in France about the relationship between architecture and engineering. It came to a head as work began at the Champ de Mars: a "Committee of Three Hundred" (one member for each metre of the tower's height) was formed, led by the prominent architect Charles Garnier and including some of the most important figures of the arts, such as William-Adolphe Bouguereau, Guy de Maupassant, Charles Gounod and Jules Massenet. A petition called "Artists against the Eiffel Tower" was sent to the Minister of Works and Commissioner for the Exposition, Adolphe Alphand, and it was published by Le Temps on 14 February 1887:

    We, writers, painters, sculptors, architects and passionate devotees of the hitherto untouched beauty of Paris, protest with all our strength, with all our indignation in the name of slighted French taste, against the erection ... of this useless and monstrous Eiffel Tower ... To bring our arguments home, imagine for a moment a giddy, ridiculous tower dominating Paris like a gigantic black smokestack, crushing under its barbaric bulk Notre Dame, the Tour Saint-Jacques, the Louvre, the Dome of les Invalides, the Arc de Triomphe, all of our humiliated monuments will disappear in this ghastly dream. And for twenty years ... we shall see stretching like a blot of ink the hateful shadow of the hateful column of bolted sheet metal.[14]

A calligram by Guillaume Apollinaire

Gustave Eiffel responded to these criticisms by comparing his tower to the Egyptian pyramids: "My tower will be the tallest edifice ever erected by man. Will it not also be grandiose in its way? And why would something admirable in Egypt become hideous and ridiculous in Paris?"[15] These criticisms were also dealt with by Édouard Lockroy in a letter of support written to Alphand, sardonically saying,[16] "Judging by the stately swell of the rhythms, the beauty of the metaphors, the elegance of its delicate and precise style, one can tell this protest is the result of collaboration of the most famous writers and poets of our time", and he explained that the protest was irrelevant since the project had been decided upon months before, and construction on the tower was already under way.

Indeed, Garnier was a member of the Tower Commission that had examined the various proposals, and had raised no objection. Eiffel was similarly unworried, pointing out to a journalist that it was premature to judge the effect of the tower solely on the basis of the drawings, that the Champ de Mars was distant enough from the monuments mentioned in the protest for there to be little risk of the tower overwhelming them, and putting the aesthetic argument for the tower: "Do not the laws of natural forces always conform to the secret laws of harmony?"[17]

Some of the protesters changed their minds when the tower was built; others remained unconvinced.[18] Guy de Maupassant supposedly ate lunch in the tower's restaurant every day because it was the one place in Paris where the tower was not visible.[19]

By 1918, it had become a symbol of Paris and of France after Guillaume Apollinaire wrote a nationalist poem in the shape of the tower (a calligram) to express his feelings about the war against Germany.[20] Today, it is widely considered to be a remarkable piece of structural art, and is often featured in films and literature.

Construction

Foundations of the Eiffel Tower, photographed in 1887

Work on the foundations started on 28 January 1887.[21] Those for the east and south legs were straightforward, with each leg resting on four 2 m (6.6 ft) concrete slabs, one for each of the principal girders of each leg. The west and north legs, being closer to the river Seine, were more complicated: each slab needed two piles installed by using compressed-air caissons 15 m (49 ft) long and 6 m (20 ft) in diameter driven to a depth of 22 m (72 ft)[22] to support the concrete slabs, which were 6 m (20 ft) thick. Each of these slabs supported a block of limestone with an inclined top to bear a supporting shoe for the ironwork.

Each shoe was anchored to the stonework by a pair of bolts 10 cm (4 in) in diameter and 7.5 m (25 ft) long. The foundations were completed on 30 June, and the erection of the ironwork began. The visible work on-site was complemented by the enormous amount of exacting preparatory work that took place behind the scenes: the drawing office produced 1,700 general drawings and 3,629 detailed drawings of the 18,038 different parts needed.[23] The task of drawing the components was complicated by the complex angles involved in the design and the degree of precision required: the position of rivet holes was specified to within 1 mm (0.04 in) and angles worked out to one second of arc.[24] The finished components, some already riveted together into sub-assemblies, arrived on horse-drawn carts from a factory in the nearby Parisian suburb of Levallois-Perret and were first bolted together, with the bolts being replaced with rivets as construction progressed. No drilling or shaping was done on site: if any part did not fit, it was sent back to the factory for alteration. In all, 18,038 pieces were joined using 2.5 million rivets.[21]

At first, the legs were constructed as cantilevers, but about halfway to the first level construction was paused to create a substantial timber scaffold. This renewed concerns about the structural integrity of the tower, and sensational headlines such as "Eiffel Suicide!" and "Gustave Eiffel Has Gone Mad: He Has Been Confined in an Asylum" appeared in the tabloid press.[25] At this stage, a small "creeper" crane designed to move up the tower was installed in each leg. They made use of the guides for the lifts which were to be fitted in the four legs. The critical stage of joining the legs at the first level was completed by the end of March 1888.[21] Although the metalwork had been prepared with the utmost attention to detail, provision had been made to carry out small adjustments to precisely align the legs; hydraulic jacks were fitted to the shoes at the base of each leg, capable of exerting a force of 800 tonnes, and the legs were intentionally constructed at a slightly steeper angle than necessary, being supported by sandboxes on the scaffold. Although construction involved 300 on-site employees,[21] due to Eiffel's safety precautions and the use of movable gangways, guardrails and screens, only one person died.[26]

    18 July 1887: The start of the erection of the metalwork

    18 July 1887:

    The start of the erection of the metalwork

    7 December 1887: Construction of the legs with scaffolding

    7 December 1887:

    Construction of the legs with scaffolding

    20 March 1888: Completion of the first level

    20 March 1888:

    Completion of the first level

    15 May 1888: Start of construction on the second stage

    15 May 1888:

    Start of construction on the second stage

    21 August 1888: Completion of the second level

    21 August 1888:

    Completion of the second level

    26 December 1888: Construction of the upper stage

    26 December 1888:

    Construction of the upper stage

    15 March 1889: Construction of the cupola

    15 March 1889:

    Construction of the cupola

Inauguration and the 1889 exposition

View of the 1889 World's Fair

The main structural work was completed at the end of March 1889 and, on 31 March, Eiffel celebrated by leading a group of government officials, accompanied by representatives of the press, to the top of the tower.[18] Because the lifts were not yet in operation, the ascent was made by foot, and took over an hour, with Eiffel stopping frequently to explain various features. Most of the party chose to stop at the lower levels, but a few, including the structural engineer, Émile Nouguier, the head of construction, Jean Compagnon, the President of the City Council, and reporters from Le Figaro and Le Monde Illustré, completed the ascent. At 2:35 pm, Eiffel hoisted a large Tricolour to the accompaniment of a 25-gun salute fired at the first level.[27]

There was still work to be done, particularly on the lifts and facilities, and the tower was not opened to the public until nine days after the opening of the exposition on 6 May; even then, the lifts had not been completed. The tower was an instant success with the public, and nearly 30,000 visitors made the 1,710-step climb to the top before the lifts entered service on 26 May.[28] Tickets cost 2 francs for the first level, 3 for the second, and 5 for the top, with half-price admission on Sundays,[29] and by the end of the exhibition there had been 1,896,987 visitors.[3]

After dark, the tower was lit by hundreds of gas lamps, and a beacon sent out three beams of red, white and blue light. Two searchlights mounted on a circular rail were used to illuminate various buildings of the exposition. The daily opening and closing of the exposition were announced by a cannon at the top.[citation needed]

Illumination of the tower at night during the exposition; painted by Georges Garen [fr], 1889

On the second level, the French newspaper Le Figaro had an office and a printing press, where a special souvenir edition, Le Figaro de la Tour, was made. There was also a pâtisserie.[citation needed]

At the top, there was a post office where visitors could send letters and postcards as a memento of their visit. Graffitists were also catered for: sheets of paper were mounted on the walls each day for visitors to record their impressions of the tower. Gustave Eiffel described the collection of responses as "truly curious".[30]

Famous visitors to the tower included the Prince of Wales, Sarah Bernhardt, "Buffalo Bill" Cody (his Wild West show was an attraction at the exposition) and Thomas Edison.[28] Eiffel invited Edison to his private apartment at the top of the tower, where Edison presented him with one of his phonographs, a new invention and one of the many highlights of the exposition.[31] Edison signed the guestbook with this message:

    To M Eiffel the Engineer the brave builder of so gigantic and original specimen of modern Engineering from one who has the greatest respect and admiration for all Engineers including the Great Engineer the Bon Dieu, Thomas Edison.

Eiffel made use of his apartment at the top of the tower to carry out meteorological observations, and also used the tower to perform experiments on the action of air resistance on falling bodies.[32]

Subsequent events

0:43

Panoramic view during ascent of the Eiffel Tower by the Lumière brothers, 1898

Eiffel had a permit for the tower to stand for 20 years. It was to be dismantled in 1909, when its ownership would revert to the City of Paris. The city had planned to tear it down (part of the original contest rules for designing a tower was that it should be easy to dismantle) but as the tower proved to be valuable for many innovations in the early 20th century, particularly radio telegraphy, it was allowed to remain after the expiry of the permit, and from 1910 it also became part of the International Time Service.[33]

For the 1900 Exposition Universelle, the lifts in the east and west legs were replaced by lifts running as far as the second level constructed by the French firm Fives-Lille. These had a compensating mechanism to keep the floor level as the angle of ascent changed at the first level, and were driven by a similar hydraulic mechanism as the Otis lifts, although this was situated at the base of the tower. Hydraulic pressure was provided by pressurised accumulators located near this mechanism.[34] At the same time the lift in the north pillar was removed and replaced by a staircase to the first level. The layout of both first and second levels was modified, with the space available for visitors on the second level. The original lift in the south pillar was removed 13 years later.[citation needed]

Santos-Dumont No. 5; 13 July 1901

On 19 October 1901, Alberto Santos-Dumont, flying his No.6 airship, won a 100,000-franc prize offered by Henri Deutsch de la Meurthe for the first person to make a flight from St. Cloud to the Eiffel Tower and back in less than half an hour.[35]

In 1910, Father Theodor Wulf measured radiant energy at the top and bottom of the tower. He found more at the top than expected, incidentally discovering what are known today as cosmic rays.[36] Two years later, on 4 February 1912, Austrian tailor Franz Reichelt died after jumping from the first level of the tower (a height of 57 m) to demonstrate his parachute design.[37] In 1914, at the outbreak of World War I, a radio transmitter located in the tower jammed German radio communications, seriously hindering their advance on Paris and contributing to the Allied victory at the First Battle of the Marne.[38] From 1925 to 1934, illuminated signs for Citroën adorned three of the tower's sides, making it the tallest advertising space in the world at the time.[39] In April 1935, the tower was used to make experimental low-resolution television transmissions, using a shortwave transmitter of 200 watts power. On 17 November, an improved 180-line transmitter was installed.[40]

The Eiffel Tower has been a subject of art, as in this cubist painting by Robert Delaunay (1911)

On two separate but related occasions in 1925, the con artist Victor Lustig "sold" the tower for scrap metal.[41] A year later, in February 1926, pilot Leon Collet was killed trying to fly under the tower. His aircraft became entangled in an aerial belonging to a wireless station.[42] A bust of Gustave Eiffel by Antoine Bourdelle was unveiled at the base of the north leg on 2 May 1929.[43] In 1930, the tower lost the title of the world's tallest structure when the Chrysler Building in New York City was completed.[44] In 1938, the decorative arcade around the first level was removed.[45]

Upon the German occupation of Paris in 1940, the lift cables were cut by the French. The tower was closed to the public during the occupation and the lifts were not repaired until 1946.[46] In 1940, German soldiers had to climb the tower to hoist a swastika-centered Reichskriegsflagge,[47] but the flag was so large it blew away just a few hours later, and was replaced by a smaller one.[48] When visiting Paris, Hitler chose to stay on the ground. When the Allies were nearing Paris in August 1944, Hitler ordered General Dietrich von Choltitz, the military governor of Paris, to demolish the tower along with the rest of the city. Von Choltitz disobeyed the order.[49] On 25 August, before the Germans had been driven out of Paris, the German flag was replaced with a Tricolour by two men from the French Naval Museum, who narrowly beat three men led by Lucien Sarniguet, who had lowered the Tricolour on 13 June 1940 when Paris fell to the Germans.[46]

A fire started in the television transmitter on 3 January 1956, damaging the top of the tower. Repairs took a year, and in 1957, the present radio aerial was added to the top.[50] In 1964, the Eiffel Tower was officially declared to be a historical monument by the Minister of Cultural Affairs, André Malraux.[51] A year later, an additional lift system was installed in the north pillar.[52]

According to interviews, in 1967, Montreal Mayor Jean Drapeau negotiated a secret agreement with Charles de Gaulle for the tower to be dismantled and temporarily relocated to Montreal to serve as a landmark and tourist attraction during Expo 67. The plan was allegedly vetoed by the company operating the tower out of fear that the French government could refuse permission for the tower to be restored in its original location.[53]

In 1982, the original lifts between the second and third levels were replaced after 97 years in service. These had been closed to the public between November and March because the water in the hydraulic drive tended to freeze. The new cars operate in pairs, with one counterbalancing the other, and perform the journey in one stage, reducing the journey time from eight minutes to less than two minutes. At the same time, two new emergency staircases were installed, replacing the original spiral staircases. In 1983, the south pillar was fitted with an electrically driven Otis lift to serve the Jules Verne restaurant.[citation needed] The Fives-Lille lifts in the east and west legs, fitted in 1899, were extensively refurbished in 1986. The cars were replaced, and a computer system was installed to completely automate the lifts. The motive power was moved from the water hydraulic system to a new electrically driven oil-filled hydraulic system, and the original water hydraulics were retained solely as a counterbalance system.[52] A service lift was added to the south pillar for moving small loads and maintenance personnel three years later.[citation needed]

Robert Moriarty flew a Beechcraft Bonanza under the tower on 31 March 1984.[54] In 1987, A. J. Hackett made one of his first bungee jumps from the top of the Eiffel Tower, using a special cord he had helped develop. Hackett was arrested by the police.[55] On 27 October 1991, Thierry Devaux, along with mountain guide Hervé Calvayrac, performed a series of acrobatic figures while bungee jumping from the second floor of the tower. Facing the Champ de Mars, Devaux used an electric winch between figures to go back up to the second floor. When firemen arrived, he stopped after the sixth jump.[56]

The tower is the focal point for New Year's Eve and Bastille Day (as in this image from 2013) celebrations.

For its "Countdown to the Year 2000" celebration on 31 December 1999, flashing lights and high-powered searchlights were installed on the tower. During the last three minutes of the year, the lights were turned on starting from the base of the tower and continuing to the top to welcome 2000 with a huge fireworks show. An exhibition above a cafeteria on the first floor commemorates this event. The searchlights on top of the tower made it a beacon in Paris's night sky, and 20,000 flashing bulbs gave the tower a sparkly appearance for five minutes every hour on the hour.[57]

The lights sparkled blue for several nights to herald the new millennium on 31 December 2000. The sparkly lighting continued for 18 months until July 2001. The sparkling lights were turned on again on 21 June 2003, and the display was planned to last for 10 years before they needed replacing.[58]

The tower received its 200,000,000th guest on 28 November 2002.[59] The tower has operated at its maximum capacity of about 7 million visitors per year since 2003.[60] In 2004, the Eiffel Tower began hosting a seasonal ice rink on the first level.[61] A glass floor was installed on the first level during the 2014 refurbishment.[62]

Design

Material

The Eiffel Tower from below

The puddle iron (wrought iron) of the Eiffel Tower weighs 7,300 tonnes,[63] and the addition of lifts, shops and antennae have brought the total weight to approximately 10,100 tonnes.[64] As a demonstration of the economy of design, if the 7,300 tonnes of metal in the structure were melted down, it would fill the square base, 125 metres (410 ft) on each side, to a depth of only 6.25 cm (2.46 in) assuming the density of the metal to be 7.8 tonnes per cubic metre.[65] Additionally, a cubic box surrounding the tower (324 m × 125 m × 125 m) would contain 6,200 tonnes of air, weighing almost as much as the iron itself. Depending on the ambient temperature, the top of the tower may shift away from the sun by up to 18 cm (7 in) due to thermal expansion of the metal on the side facing the sun.[66]

Wind and weather considerations

Lightning striking the tower in 1902

When it was built, many were shocked by the tower's daring form. Eiffel was accused of trying to create something artistic with no regard to the principles of engineering. However, Eiffel and his team – experienced bridge builders – understood the importance of wind forces, and knew that if they were going to build the tallest structure in the world, they had to be sure it could withstand them. In an interview with the newspaper Le Temps published on 14 February 1887, Eiffel said:

    Is it not true that the very conditions which give strength also conform to the hidden rules of harmony? ... Now to what phenomenon did I have to give primary concern in designing the Tower? It was wind resistance. Well then! I hold that the curvature of the monument's four outer edges, which is as mathematical calculation dictated it should be ... will give a great impression of strength and beauty, for it will reveal to the eyes of the observer the boldness of the design as a whole.[67]

He used graphical methods to determine the strength of the tower and empirical evidence to account for the effects of wind, rather than a mathematical formula. Close examination of the tower reveals a basically exponential shape.[68] All parts of the tower were overdesigned to ensure maximum resistance to wind forces. The top half was even assumed to have no gaps in the latticework.[69] In the years since it was completed, engineers have put forward various mathematical hypotheses in an attempt to explain the success of the design. The most recent, devised in 2004 after letters sent by Eiffel to the French Society of Civil Engineers in 1885 were translated into English, is described as a non-linear integral equation based on counteracting the wind pressure on any point of the tower with the tension between the construction elements at that point.[68]

The Eiffel Tower sways by up to 9 cm (3.5 in) in the wind.[70]

Floors

Ground floor

Base of the Eiffel Tower

The four columns of the tower each house access stairs and elevators to the first two floors, while at the south column only the elevator to the second floor restaurant is publicly accessible.

1st floor

Original restaurants at the 1st floor, as viewed from inside the tower

The first floor is publicly accessible by elevator or stairs. When originally built, the first level contained three restaurants – one French, one Russian and one Flemish — and an "Anglo-American Bar". After the exposition closed, the Flemish restaurant was converted to a 250-seat theatre. Today there is the Le 58 Tour Eiffel restaurant and other facilities.

A promenade 2.6-metre (8 ft 6 in) wide ran around the outside of the first level

2nd floor

The second floor is publicly accessible by elevator or stairs and has a restaurant called Le Jules Verne, a gourmet restaurant with its own lift going up from the south column to the second level. This restaurant has one star in the Michelin Red Guide. It was run by the multi-Michelin star chef Alain Ducasse from 2007 to 2017.[71] As of May 2019, it is managed by three-star chef Frédéric Anton.[72] It owes its name to the famous science-fiction writer Jules Verne.

3rd floor

The third floor is the top floor, publicly accessible by elevator.

Originally there were laboratories for various experiments, and a small apartment reserved for Gustave Eiffel to entertain guests, which is now open to the public, complete with period decorations and lifelike mannequins of Eiffel and some of his notable guests.[73]

Gustave Eiffel's apartment at the third floor

From 1937 until 1981, there was a restaurant near the top of the tower. It was removed due to structural considerations; engineers had determined it was too heavy and was causing the tower to sag.[74] This restaurant was sold to an American restaurateur and transported to New York and then New Orleans. It was rebuilt on the edge of New Orleans' Garden District as a restaurant and later event hall.[75] Today there is a champagne bar.

Lifts

The arrangement of the lifts has been changed several times during the tower's history. Given the elasticity of the cables and the time taken to align the cars with the landings, each lift, in normal service, takes an average of 8 minutes and 50 seconds to do the round trip, spending an average of 1 minute and 15 seconds at each level. The average journey time between levels is 1 minute. The original hydraulic mechanism is on public display in a small museum at the base of the east and west legs. Because the mechanism requires frequent lubrication and maintenance, public access is often restricted. The rope mechanism of the north tower can be seen as visitors exit the lift.[76]

The Roux, Combaluzier & Lepape lifts during construction. Note the drive sprockets and chain in the foreground.

Equipping the tower with adequate and safe passenger lifts was a major concern of the government commission overseeing the Exposition. Although some visitors could be expected to climb to the first level, or even the second, lifts clearly had to be the main means of ascent.[77]

Constructing lifts to reach the first level was relatively straightforward: the legs were wide enough at the bottom and so nearly straight that they could contain a straight track, and a contract was given to the French company Roux, Combaluzier & Lepape for two lifts to be fitted in the east and west legs.[78] Roux, Combaluzier & Lepape used a pair of endless chains with rigid, articulated links to which the car was attached. Lead weights on some links of the upper or return sections of the chains counterbalanced most of the car's weight. The car was pushed up from below, not pulled up from above: to prevent the chain buckling, it was enclosed in a conduit. At the bottom of the run, the chains passed around 3.9 m (12 ft 10 in) diameter sprockets. Smaller sprockets at the top guided the chains.[78]

The Otis lifts originally fitted in the north and south legs

Installing lifts to the second level was more of a challenge because a straight track was impossible. No French company wanted to undertake the work. The European branch of Otis Brothers & Company submitted a proposal but this was rejected: the fair's charter ruled out the use of any foreign material in the construction of the tower. The deadline for bids was extended but still no French companies put themselves forward, and eventually the contract was given to Otis in July 1887.[34] Otis were confident they would eventually be given the contract and had already started creating designs.[citation needed]

The car was divided into two superimposed compartments, each holding 25 passengers, with the lift operator occupying an exterior platform on the first level. Motive power was provided by an inclined hydraulic ram 12.67 m (41 ft 7 in) long and 96.5 cm (38.0 in) in diameter in the tower leg with a stroke of 10.83 m (35 ft 6 in): this moved a carriage carrying six sheaves. Five fixed sheaves were mounted higher up the leg, producing an arrangement similar to a block and tackle but acting in reverse, multiplying the stroke of the piston rather than the force generated. The hydraulic pressure in the driving cylinder was produced by a large open reservoir on the second level. After being exhausted from the cylinder, the water was pumped back up to the reservoir by two pumps in the machinery room at the base of the south leg. This reservoir also provided power to the lifts to the first level.[citation needed]

The original lifts for the journey between the second and third levels were supplied by Léon Edoux. A pair of 81 m (266 ft) hydraulic rams were mounted on the second level, reaching nearly halfway up to the third level. One lift car was mounted on top of these rams: cables ran from the top of this car up to sheaves on the third level and back down to a second car. Each car travelled only half the distance between the second and third levels and passengers were required to change lifts halfway by means of a short gangway. The 10-ton cars each held 65 passengers.[79]

Engraved names

Main article: List of the 72 names on the Eiffel Tower

Names engraved on the tower

Gustave Eiffel engraved on the tower the names of 72 French scientists, engineers and mathematicians in recognition of their contributions to the building of the tower. Eiffel chose this "invocation of science" because of his concern over the artists' protest. At the beginning of the 20th century, the engravings were painted over, but they were restored in 1986–87 by the Société Nouvelle d'exploitation de la Tour Eiffel, a company operating the tower.[80]

Aesthetics

Some original architectural details

The tower is painted in three shades: lighter at the top, getting progressively darker towards the bottom to complement the Parisian sky.[81] It was originally reddish brown; this changed in 1968 to a bronze colour known as "Eiffel Tower Brown".[82] In what is expected to be a temporary change, the tower is being painted gold in commemoration of the upcoming 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris.[83][84]

The only non-structural elements are the four decorative grill-work arches, added in Sauvestre's sketches, which served to make the tower look more substantial and to make a more impressive entrance to the exposition.[85]

A pop-culture movie cliché is that the view from a Parisian window always includes the tower.[86] In reality, since zoning restrictions limit the height of most buildings in Paris to seven storeys, only a small number of tall buildings have a clear view of the tower.[87]

Eiffel Tower Drone

Maintenance

Maintenance of the tower includes applying 60 tons of paint every seven years to prevent it from rusting. The tower has been completely repainted at least 19 times since it was built. Lead paint was still being used as recently as 2001 when the practice was stopped out of concern for the environment.[58][88]

Communications

Top of the Eiffel Tower with antennas

The tower has been used for making radio transmissions since the beginning of the 20th century. Until the 1950s, sets of aerial wires ran from the cupola to anchors on the Avenue de Suffren and Champ de Mars. These were connected to longwave transmitters in small bunkers. In 1909, a permanent underground radio centre was built near the south pillar, which still exists today. On 20 November 1913, the Paris Observatory, using the Eiffel Tower as an aerial, exchanged wireless signals with the United States Naval Observatory, which used an aerial in Arlington County, Virginia. The object of the transmissions was to measure the difference in longitude between Paris and Washington, D.C.[89] Today, radio and digital television signals are transmitted from the Eiffel Tower.

FM radio

Frequency kW Service

87.8 MHz 10 France Inter

89.0 MHz 10 RFI Paris

89.9 MHz 6 TSF Jazz

90.4 MHz 10 Nostalgie

90.9 MHz 4 Chante France

Digital television

A television antenna was first installed on the tower in 1957, increasing its height by 18.7 m (61 ft). Work carried out in 2000 added a further 5.3 m (17 ft), giving the current height of 324 m (1,063 ft).[58] Analogue television signals from the Eiffel Tower ceased on 8 March 2011.

Frequency VHF UHF kW Service

182.25 MHz 6 — 100 Canal+

479.25 MHz — 22 500 France 2

503.25 MHz — 25 500 TF1

527.25 MHz — 28 500 France 3

543.25 MHz — 30 100 France 5

567.25 MHz — 33 100 M6

Dimensions

Current dimensions of the tower

Height changes

The pinnacle height of the Eiffel Tower has changed multiple times over the years as described in the chart below.[90]

From To Height m Height ft Type of addition Remarks

1889 1957 312.27 1,025 Flagpole Architectural height of 300 m (980 ft) Tallest freestanding structure in the world until surpassed by the Chrysler Building in 1930. Tallest tower in the world until surpassed by the KCTV Broadcast Tower in 1956.

1957 1991 320.75 1,052 Antenna Broadcast antenna added in 1957 which made it the tallest tower in the world until the Tokyo Tower was completed the following year in 1958.

1991 1994 317.96 1,043 Antenna change

1994 2000 318.7 1,046 Antenna change

2000 2022 324 1,063 Antenna change

2022 Current 330 1,083 Antenna change Digital radio antenna hoisted on March 15, 2022.[91]

Panorama of Paris from the Tour Eiffel

Panorama of Paris and its suburbs from the top of the Eiffel Tower

Taller structures

The Eiffel Tower was the world's tallest structure when completed in 1889, a distinction it retained until 1929 when the Chrysler Building in New York City was topped out.[92] The tower also lost its standing as the world's tallest tower to the Tokyo Tower in 1958 but retains its status as the tallest freestanding (non-guyed) structure in France.

Lattice towers taller than the Eiffel Tower

Further information: List of tallest towers in the world, Lattice tower, and Observation deck

Name Pinnacle height Year Country Town Remarks

Tokyo Skytree 634 m (2,080 ft) 2011 Japan Tokyo

Kyiv TV Tower 385 m (1,263 ft) 1973 Ukraine Kyiv

Dragon Tower 336 m (1,102 ft) 2000 China Harbin

Tokyo Tower 333 m (1,093 ft) 1958 Japan Tokyo

WITI TV Tower 329.4 m (1,081 ft) 1962 United States Shorewood, Wisconsin

St. Petersburg TV Tower 326 m (1,070 ft) 1962 Russia Saint Petersburg

Structures in France taller than the Eiffel Tower

Further information: List of tallest structures in France

Name Pinnacle height Year Structure type Town Remarks

Longwave transmitter Allouis 350 m (1,150 ft) 1974 Guyed mast Allouis

HWU transmitter 350 m (1,150 ft) 1971 Guyed mast Rosnay Military VLF transmitter; multiple masts

Viaduc de Millau 343 m (1,125 ft) 2004 Bridge pillar Millau

TV Mast Niort-Maisonnay 330 m (1,080 ft) 1978 Guyed mast Niort

Transmitter Le Mans-Mayet 342 m (1,122 ft) 1993 Guyed mast Mayet

La Regine transmitter 330 m (1,080 ft) 1973 Guyed mast Saissac Military VLF transmitter

Transmitter Roumoules 330 m (1,080 ft) 1974 Guyed mast Roumoules Spare transmission mast for longwave; insulated against ground

Tourism

Transport

The nearest Paris Métro station is Bir-Hakeim and the nearest RER station is Champ de Mars-Tour Eiffel.[93] The tower itself is located at the intersection of the quai Branly and the Pont d'Iéna.

Popularity

Number of visitors per year between 1889 and 2004

More than 300 million people have visited the tower since it was completed in 1889.[94][3] In 2015, there were 6.91 million visitors.[95] The tower is the most-visited paid monument in the world.[5] An average of 25,000 people ascend the tower every day (which can result in long queues).[96]

Illumination copyright

Further information: Freedom of panorama § France

The Eiffel Tower illuminated in 2015

The tower and its image have been in the public domain since 1993, 70 years after Eiffel's death.[97] In June 1990 a French court ruled that a special lighting display on the tower in 1989 to mark the tower's 100th anniversary was an "original visual creation" protected by copyright. The Court of Cassation, France's judicial court of last resort, upheld the ruling in March 1992.[98] The Société d'Exploitation de la Tour Eiffel (SETE) now considers any illumination of the tower to be a separate work of art that falls under copyright.[99] As a result, the SNTE alleges that it is illegal to publish contemporary photographs of the lit tower at night without permission in France and some other countries for commercial use.[100][101] For this reason, it is often rare to find images or videos of the lit tower at night on stock image sites,[102] and media outlets rarely broadcast images or videos of it.[103]

The imposition of copyright has been controversial. The Director of Documentation for what was then called the Société Nouvelle d'exploitation de la Tour Eiffel (SNTE), Stéphane Dieu, commented in 2005: "It is really just a way to manage commercial use of the image, so that it isn't used in ways [of which] we don't approve".[104] SNTE made over €1 million from copyright fees in 2002.[105] However, it could also be used to restrict the publication of tourist photographs of the tower at night, as well as hindering non-profit and semi-commercial publication of images of the illuminated tower.[106]

The copyright claim itself has never been tested in courts to date, according to a 2014 article in the Art Law Journal, and there has never been an attempt to track down millions of people who have posted and shared their images of the illuminated tower on the Internet worldwide. It added, however, that permissive situation may arise on commercial use of such images, like in a magazine, on a film poster, or on product packaging.[107]

French doctrine and jurisprudence allows pictures incorporating a copyrighted work as long as their presence is incidental or accessory to the subject being represented,[108] a reasoning akin to the de minimis rule. Therefore, SETE may be unable to claim copyright on photographs of Paris which happen to include the lit tower.

Replicas

Main article: List of Eiffel Tower replicas

Replica at the Paris Las Vegas Hotel, Nevada, United States

As one of the most famous landmarks in the world, the Eiffel Tower has been the inspiration for the creation of many replicas and similar towers. An early example is Blackpool Tower in England. The mayor of Blackpool, Sir John Bickerstaffe, was so impressed on seeing the Eiffel Tower at the 1889 exposition that he commissioned a similar tower to be built in his town. It opened in 1894 and is 158.1 m (519 ft) tall.[109] Tokyo Tower in Japan, built as a communications tower in 1958, was also inspired by the Eiffel Tower.[110]

There are various scale models of the tower in the United States, including a half-scale version at the Paris Las Vegas, Nevada, one in Paris, Texas built in 1993, and two 1:3 scale models at Kings Island, located in Mason, Ohio, and Kings Dominion, Virginia, amusement parks opened in 1972 and 1975 respectively. Two 1:3 scale models can be found in China, one in Durango, Mexico that was donated by the local French community, and several across Europe.[111]

In 2011, the TV show Pricing the Priceless on the National Geographic Channel speculated that a full-size replica of the tower would cost approximately US$480 million to build.[112] This would be more than ten times the cost of the original (nearly 8 million in 1890 Francs; ~US$40 million in 2018 dollars).

See also

    flagFrance portal

    List of tallest buildings and structures in the Paris region

    List of tallest buildings and structures

    List of tallest towers

    List of tallest freestanding structures

    List of tallest freestanding steel structures

    List of tallest structures built before the 20th century

    List of transmission sites

    Lattice tower

    Eiffel Tower, 1909–1928 painting series by Robert Delaunay

The 53 best cities in the world in 2022

We quizzed 20,000 city-dwellers to rank the best cities in the world right now. Ready?

Edited by Huw OliverContributors Time Out editors & Time Out contributors Monday 11 July 2022

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Every year, we quiz thousands of city-dwellers worldwide about life in their hometown right now. We want to know about the restaurant scene and the bar circuit. The theatre and the art galleries. The nightlife and the dating apps. What the neighbours are like and which neighbourhoods are actually cool. The idea is to create a global snapshot of city living, and point people in the direction of the places locals are really raving about.

And now... the results of the Time Out Index 2022 are in! As ever, we’ve crunched all that data and used it to come up with our annual ranking of the world’s greatest cities. For the past two years, the list has focused on how cities pulled together through the pandemic and made life (just about) tolerable during lockdowns. But now, after two years of travel curbs, the world is opening up again, and we – like you – are itching to get back out there.

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So while things like community spirit and resilience were two of the most important factors last year, in 2022 we’ve added extra weight to the things that make cities great places to visit as well as to live. Our top cities this year are the ones with thriving nightlife, amazing food and drink, and art, culture and museums galore. We’ve highlighted places that aren’t boring or overly expensive or overrated, and we’ve ensured that our top picks also score well for practical stuff like walkability, good public transport and safety, as well as sustainability.

We’ve also tapped into our global network of expert editors and contributors for the inside scoop on what’s making each city tick right now, what’s new and what’s generally popping off. All of which means that if you are planning a city break this year (especially if it’s your first in a long, long time) then these are the places to go. Catch you out there.

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The 53 best cities in the world for 2022

Edinburgh

Photograph: David Ridley / Shutterstock.com

1. Edinburgh

What makes us great: We all know what Edinburgh is best known for. But year round, the Scottish capital is hard to beat, with landmarks, architecture and scenic hotspots that make it one of the most beautiful cities to explore on foot, as well as a food and drink scene that has an ever-evolving selection of forward-thinking bars and eateries, from new Leith restaurant and wine bar Eleanore to Bonnie & Wild’s Scottish Marketplace at the St James Quarter. This is a city full of warmth that encourages self-expression across communities via its art, culture and nightlife. It’s progressive and forever welcoming of all groups (no wonder 88 percent of locals told us it was easy to ‘express who you are’ in the city). Plus, there’s the small matter of those festivals returning this August...

Visit now because: There are some terrific new openings worth checking out, including Glasgow Asian-inspired favourite Ka Pao, Stockbridge chocolate café Ocelot and Leith neighbourhood gem Cocorico. The city is also about to get Scotland’s first ‘vertical distillery’ in the form of the Port of Leith Distillery on the waterfront.

The big numbers: Edinburgh ranked highly in the Index across the board, coming top for both the number of residents who thought the city was beautiful (95 percent) and those who deemed it walkable (93 percent). And who would we be to argue with that very, very sweet combo? —Arusa Qureshi, Time Out Edinburgh

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Chicago

Photograph: S-F / Shutterstock.com

2. Chicago

What makes us great: It may have been a tough week for our city, but we know Chicago will pull through: a massive 55 percent of locals described it as resilient in this year’s Index (the fourth highest in the world), and we’d be inclined to agree. After two years of on-off restrictions, we’ve come out stronger and more united, and now our beloved Midwest metropolis is thriving again – so much so, it was voted the funnest city in the world this year, too. Whether you want to try world-class dining, party until 4am at historic clubs, spend a day soaking up the sun along Lake Michigan, see iconic artworks or just wander among different neighbourhoods, there’s never a dull moment to be had (yes, even when winter rolls around).

Visit now because: The food scene is popping off. We’re talking everything from sleek, high-end restaurants on Randolph Street and the country’s first-ever Michelin-starred Filipino tasting menu to some of the best mom-and-pop Mexican joints you’ll find in a big US city.

The big numbers: A whopping 96 percent of locals rate Chicago highly for its food and drink – the second highest in the world – with 95 percent saying the same about the city’s art and culture scene. —Emma Krupp, Time Out Chicago

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Medellín

Photograph: Fotos593 / Shutterstock.com

3. Medellín

What makes us great: Known as the City of Eternal Spring, Medellín offers more than just good weather year round. Fervently proud of their city (this being the only one in Colombia to have a metro system), the Paisa people are brimming with energy, entrepreneurship and curiosity; it’s really hard not to make good friends here. In this year’s survey, Medellín’s nightlife was voted the world’s best, though that’s perhaps not all that surprising given this is the city that gave us reggaeton artists J Balvin, Maluma and Karol G. El Social, Salón Amador, Vintrash or any bar along La 70 will show you a good time.

Visit now because: Design-forward boutique hotels, like Quinta Ladera and Landmark, are popping up all over the city, showcasing impressive Colombian craftsmanship. Meanwhile, suave cocktail bar Casa El Ramal just opened in Manila and Mad Radio in Provenza hosts sets by DJs from Medellín and beyond.

The big numbers: This city sure likes to indulge itself. Medellín was voted the best in the world for eating and drinking (with 97 percent of Medellinenses saying the food and booze here is good), and the same goes for nightlife (90 percent) and community spirit (94 percent). —Laura Field

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Glasgow

Photograph: Jaroslav Moravcik / Shutterstock.com

4. Glasgow

What makes us great: Casual kindness and good humour prevail in the city voted friendliest in this year’s Index. Glasgow excels at being outgoing and at going out. At SWG3, the world’s first body-heated club, dancing literally helps keep the lights on. There are now two Michelin-star restaurants after a long drought (Cail Bruich and Unalome), yet a burgeoning dining scene is best characterised by friendly informality and good value for money (Glasgow was the city second least likely to be described as expensive). The dusty Barrowland Ballroom remains the reassuringly unchanging temple to live music you and your favourite band deserve.

Visit now because: Glasgow was doing quality meat-free dining way before it was fashionable and natural wine bar and vegetarian/vegan restaurant Sylvan continues the trend. Other top-tier recent openings include Crabshakk (for excellent seafood and cocktails) and Big Counter (uncategorisable, in the best way possible).

The big numbers: An enormous 78 percent of Glaswegians described their city as friendly, pipping last year’s winner Manchester to the top spot. The city also ranked well overall thanks to its vast amount of green space and the variety of things to do. —Malcolm Jack

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Amsterdam

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5. Amsterdam

What makes us great: In many ways, Amsterdam is the perfect destination. It brims with great places to see art and pick up jazzy gifts, but is also damn chilled out; it’s large enough to reward exploration yet still eminently walkable (or cyclable!) The city combines a buzzy social scene and vibrant nightlife with tolerance and diversity – Index respondents named their city the easiest place in the world to ‘express who you are’, and also voted it the second most progressive in the world. No wonder so many commentators say this is the model twenty-first-century metropolis.

Visit now because: The city’s festival circuit is finally back in action – go for Pride (August 5 to 7), when flotillas of boats will turn the inner canal ring into party central, or the notoriously wild (and very fun) Amsterdam Dance Event (October 19 to 23).

The big numbers: In news that will surprise absolutely no one, 100 percent of Amsterdammers said they could easily navigate the city on two wheels – making it the best place in the world for cyclists. One hundred percent! —Derek Robertson

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Prague

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6. Prague

What makes us great: Few capitals look so good, so it’s no surprise that Prague was voted the world’s third most beautiful city in this year’s Index. But it isn’t just a pretty face. Visitors are discovering an increasingly attractive quality of life, demonstrated by a huge number of galleries and museums, and quality, affordable dining all over the shop. Locals stress it’s easy to ‘get around on public transport’ too. For some peace and quiet, take their advice and get back to nature, notably at Divoká Šárka Valley, which you can reach without even having to leave the city.

Visit now because: Revamped public spaces have much to offer. The recently completed riverbank at Náplavka has been nominated for a prestigious architecture award. Downstream, leafy Střelecký ostrov island offers timeless views.

The big numbers: A good 90 percent percent of Praguers said their city was beautiful, and even more – 96 percent – said they rated the city’s public transport system. Trams, they rule, y’know. —David Creighton

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Marrakech

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7. Marrakech

What makes us great: Community, creativity and faith in the future have seen Marrakech come roaring out of the pandemic with a new lease of life. The city has long been famous as an international melting pot, but lockdown created space for local entrepreneurs to flex their muscles opening cool new boutiques like Moro and restaurants such as Mouton Noir. A new international storytelling festival greeted the city’s first post-pandemic visitors in February, while big players like La Mamounia are sporting sassy new looks and El Fenn launched the hottest Sunday music nights in town. No wonder visitors can’t wait to return.

Visit now because: Morocco’s cultural capital is thriving right now. Those sessions on El Fenn’s rooftop are not to be missed, while MACAAL and MCC Gallery host brilliant modern African art exhibitions.

The big numbers: Think of Marrakech and you’ve almost certainly got the city’s packed, buzzing medina in mind, so it’s no wonder the city ranked so highly for getting to know your neighbours (68 percent of respondents said this was easy – the highest in the world) and making new friends (70 percent). —Paula Hardy

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Berlin

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8. Berlin

What makes us great: There is truly something for every kind of visitor in Berlin. The city’s infamous weekend-long parties are in full force, and when it comes to fine dining, the German capital has never been more minted. From revolutionary walking tours to cutting-edge contemporary art shows, smaller budgets are very well catered for (just 10 percent of respondents described the city as expensive, in fact, which is the lowest anywhere in the world). Relax at one of the city’s beloved spas, or get your heart pumping at an all-night rave in one of Berlin’s world-renowned clubs – you’ll go away reinvigorated either way.

Visit now because: Travelling within the city has never been cheaper: between June and August, a pass that covers trains, trams and buses will set you back just €9 per month.

The big numbers: When it comes to transport, in fact, Berliners consider themselves very, very fortunate indeed. An incredible 97 percent praised the city’s public transit system – the highest in any city in the world. —Nathan Ma

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Montreal

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9. Montreal

What makes us great: There’s never been a more exciting time to visit Montreal. The city has bounced back post-pandemic, with a crop of new restaurants, bars and some seriously positive energy. Montreal’s awe-inspiring architecture, friendly vibes and legendary hospitality hasn’t changed – and that mix of European culture and Québécois joie de vivre is still alive and well – but you’ll discover fresh new stuff, whether it’s Michelin-calibre meals or mind-blowing budget food.

Visit now because: It’s prime festival season, with the whole city coming together to celebrate art and culture on every corner. We’re talking free concerts, waterfront festivals and a nightlife scene on steroids.

The big numbers: Montreal boasts solid results across the board: 93 percent of locals rate the city’s food and drink scene, while 82 percent praised its art and museums, and 80 percent said it’s easy to take a walk in nature. A true all-rounder. —Laura Osborne, Time Out Canada

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Copenhagen

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10. Copenhagen

What makes us great: The Danish capital is much more than bakeries and hot people on bikes. Enjoy these (and then some) by enjoying the city on foot (something 86 percent of Copenhageners said is easy, according to our survey). Dip into markets like Torvehallerne, Broens Gadekøkken, Banegaarden and Reffen, before hiring an electric GoBoat and chatting to other amateur cruisers when you dock for a beer in the sun. Come evening, explore the city’s world-beating nightlife and stay out until late – this really is a city that likes to party (and all the more so post-Covid).

Visit now because: Few cities have embraced their waterways quite like Copenhagen. Hydrofoil bikes, floating saunas, jacuzzis and even kayak bars will all be giving CPH life this summer.

The big numbers: Copenhagen is still one of the world’s great green cities, ranking second in the world for sustainability (with 75 percent of positive responses), walkability (86 percent) and ease of getting around by bike (97 percent). —Alex Hayward

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Cape Town

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11. Cape Town

What makes us great: Good food, culture, mountains, beaches, nightlife – you can do it all in Cape Town. Few cities are better for outdoorsy types, what with all the excellent swimming spots, from Clifton and Camps Bay on the Atlantic side to Muizenberg and Simon’s Town on the Indian. Not to mention all the hiking opportunities offered up by the likes of Newlands Forest, Cecilia Forest and Kirstenbosch Garden (93 percent of locals described their city as beautiful, the second highest in the world, and for good reason). Head back into town, order a boerewors (hot dog) roll and you’ll basically be in heaven.

Visit now because: Cape Town nurtures theatre-making, and it shows. The city is known for its dance and experimental works – hit up the Baxter Theatre or Artscape.

The big numbers: Eighty-seven percent of those polled in Cape Town said it was easy to relax – more than anywhere else in the world. Meanwhile, 93 percent said they rated the city highly for the variety of things to do. —Yazeed Kamaldien

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Madrid

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12. Madrid

What makes us great: Madrid isn’t how it used to be – very much in a good way. It’s just as fun and welcoming as it has been in years gone by, but each day, you’ll find more to do, see and – crucially – eat than ever before. No wonder a whopping 94 percent of people praised the Spanish capital for its food and drink. And with high-calibre museums including the Prado, the Reina Sofía and the Thyssen-Bornemisza, it’s no surprise 95 percent of locals rate its art and culture, too.

Visit now because: Stroll through the recently renovated Plaza de España and dive into one of the area’s many brilliant restaurants (our fave is RavioXO by Michelin-star chef Dabiz Muñoz).

The big numbers: There’s never a dull moment in the Spanish capital – only 1 percent of Madrileños would describe their city as boring. And on top of those high food and culture ratings, 86 percent of locals say the city’s nightlife is excellent too. —Noelia Santos, Time Out Madrid

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Manchester

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13. Manchester

What makes us great: Voted the second friendliest city in the world this year, Manchester will always make you feel at home, with its ever-welcoming landscape of restaurants, bars and top-notch culture (feline-themed eateries Neon Tiger and Kitten are two formidable recent additions). A true melting pot, Manchester is a resilient, progressive city, appreciative of its history but always looking ahead. Right now we’re in amazing shape, with expanding neighbourhoods like Ancoats and Prestwich surely among the best and easiest places to live in the world.

Visit now because: Well, perhaps wait until early next year, when Factory, one of Europe’s biggest and most exciting new arts venues, opens its doors. Nearby, the Victorian Castlefield Viaduct will also be turned into the city’s very own highline-style park.

The big numbers: Despite losing the top spot to Glasgow, a huge proportion of Mancunians (74 percent) still vouch for their city’s friendliness. On the flipside, just 11 percent said they thought Manchester was a beautiful city – the lowest in the world. Come on, guys – where’s the love for Manny’s post-industrial chic? —Rob Martin, Time Out Manchester

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Mumbai

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14. Mumbai

What makes us great: From the corporate giants to the glitzy film industry and the always-buzzing food and nightlife scenes, Mumbai offers a space for those who dream big. Pandemic or not, the city’s spirit is defined by the way its citizens bond in times of celebration as well as crisis. From helping those in need to creating opportunities for those who dare to try, this city attracts people like bees to honey. And the nightlife doesn’t just stop at the clubs – great food can be found 24/7, with a front row seat by the bay if you so wish.

Visit now because: Lately, the city seems smitten by Japanese flavours, with swanky new restaurants including Akina, Koishii, Wakai and, the current talk-of-the-town, Neuma by Bollywood stalwart Karan Johar.

The big numbers: Eighty-nine percent of locals rated Mumbai’s nightlife highly – the third best in the entire world. It was also third for community spirit (with 81 percent of positive responses) and scored very highly for its food and drink (94 percent). —Kasturi Gadge

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Melbourne

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15. Melbourne

What makes us great: Keeping up with the latest bar, café and restaurant openings in Melbourne has always felt like a sport – but now it’s reached Olympic levels. After two years of lockdowns, the Melbourne restaurant renaissance is blessing us with a plethora of bucket-list drinking and dining experiences. And it wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say every corner of the state is currently lit up and illuminated with arts festivals. Think live music, outdoor installations and stunning semi-permanent exhibitions. Truly, the city has never felt more alive.

Visit now because: As Melbourne temperatures plummet, head inside cosy new venues like Otōto, Serai and Parcs – all mirroring a prominent culinary trend of charry, caramelised dishes made with a waste-not approach to produce.

The big numbers: That blizzard of new post-pandemic openings has certainly boosted Melbourne’s position in the Index. Of those surveyed, a staggering 92 percent said the city’s food and drink scene is currently on point. —Eliza Campbell, Time Out Melbourne

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Taipei

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16. Taipei

What makes us great: We kept Covid out for more than two years without any lockdown – something that embodies Taiwan’s fantastic community spirit and resilience. Taipei is also Asia’s top queer destination, having legalised gay marriage in 2019. Transport is efficient and super-affordable and you’ll never go hungry, thanks to our night markets, stacked with sweet and savoury local treats. The messy urban landscape hides mysterious centuries-old temples, picnic-perfect parks and a Japanese-era police station with walk-in cell exhibits.

Visit now because: The pandemic taught subtropical Taipei the joy of partying outdoors, whether it’s a chilled craft beer from a riverside bar or a brand-new rooftop club with an astonishing citywide vista.

The big numbers: An impressive 86 percent of Taipei residents described their city as safe and 58 percent as sustainable, with 92 percent lauding its public transport system. —Dinah Gardner

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London

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17. London

What makes us great: London is properly fun again. While it’s true the cost-of-living crisis has seriously affected our ability to have a good time on the cheap, our city has a better vibe currently than you might reasonably expect. Having all of our free galleries and museums open up again (no need to book slots any more) was a great reminder of quite how democratised culture is here. Meanwhile, nightlife has experienced an unforeseen (by me, anyway) resurgence, with new club nights appearing, often jumping from venue to venue like glitter-and-baggie-strewn pop-ups. London gets a bad rap for catering exclusively to the moneyed and middle-aged, so it’s great to see something genuinely transgressive bubbling up again.

Visit now because: We’ve got All Points East and Field Day coming up in August. Two exceptionally fun, very credible, London festivals that take place in one of my favourite parks.

The big numbers: When it comes to the sheer amount of stuff to see and do, nowhere is better than London. Ninety-four percent of Londoners rate the city’s variety of things to do – the highest in the world – with the same proportion saying the arts scene here is particularly decent. —Joe Mackertich, Time Out London

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Porto

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18. Porto

What makes us great: Portuenses like few things better than a drink at the end of the day – especially if you manage to bag a table somewhere with views over the Douro River. The people of Portugal’s second city are also generally open-minded, albeit very particular about what they eat. Perhaps that’s why there are so many good restaurants in this city, serving everything from trad tripe dishes and sarrabulho porridge to avant-garde Michelin-star cuisine. Little wonder, in other words, that 96 percent of Porto locals rate the city’s food scene highly, according to this year’s Index. Bom apetite!

Visit now because: Two of the city’s most iconic restaurateurs have launched excellent new projects. Vasco Coelho Santos (owner of Euskalduna Studio) has opened a ‘slow fermentation’ bakery, while Ricardo Rodrigues (Fava Tonka, Terminal 4450) now runs a magical Mexican restaurant called La Dolorosa.

The big numbers: Aside from its extraordinary food and drink culture, Portugal’s second city was described as being pretty chill all-round. Seventy-five percent said it’s easy to relax in the city and 76 percent said it was easy to ‘express who you are’. —Mariana Morais Pinheiro, Time Out Porto

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Lyon

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19. Lyon

What makes us great: Boy does Lyon look good. With its two major rivers, an immense urban park (with resident giraffes) and a new outdoor art gallery comprising 150 public murals, France’s second city is as attractive as they come. But it’s wine rather than water that flows through the city’s veins; the riverbanks are lined with floating bars and the city is sandwiched between the Rhône Valley and Beaujolais winegrowing regions (no doubt a contributing factor in a good 71 percent of locals saying they find their city relaxing). And ditch the car, why don’t you? Lyon has a whopping 540km of cycle lanes.

Visit now because: All sorts of incredible cultural events are hosted here year round, from concerts in Roman amphitheatres to the celebrated Fête des Lumières in winter. Stay for the food: artisanal food markets and new vegan restaurants are reinvigorating France’s gastronomic capital.

The big numbers: Lyonnais are famously proud of their own city and that’s certainly still the case in 2022. Ninety-five percent of residents tooted the horn of their city’s food and drink culture, while 88 percent described their city as beautiful. —Anna Richards

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New York

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20. New York

What makes us great: New York feels more vibrant than ever. What could have destroyed the Big Apple over the past couple of years has just made it stronger – in fact, NYC was voted the most resilient city in the world this year. Our city has bounced back back with even more creative exhibitions and the best theatre we’ve seen in decades (we know, because NYC was also voted the third best in the world for art, culture and museums).

Visit now because: NYC’s rebirth has brought creativity to the forefront. At bars, you’ll find dedicated martini menus and more speakeasy concepts than you can handle. The fun and funk of roller discos is now at Rockefeller Center and Central Park. There are Pulitzer Prize-winning shows on Broadway and highly anticipated exhibition openings happening this year, from a Basquiat retrospective to an entire show on the Tudors at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

The big numbers: NYC topped both of the ‘international’ categories in this year’s Index. It was far and away the most popular city that Time Out readers wanted to visit in 2022 and also the place the most people actually wanted to move. —Shaye Weaver, Time Out New York

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Buenos Aires

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21. Buenos Aires

What makes us great: South America’s most culturally exciting city, Buenos Aires is a magnet for cocktail aficionados, gourmands and culture vultures, thanks to its abundance of award-winning bars and restaurants, and a buzzing arts scene with free museums, art galleries and cultural festivals that keep porteños (the Argentinian capital’s residents) entertained long into the night. Chacarita is BA’s latest foodie hub – order haute cuisine or ramen, a slice of muza pizza or Filipino tapas, a late-night Negroni or a Malbec round the clock. A wave of indoor and outdoor food-hall openings is also satisfying porteño appetites, including freshly refurbished Mercado de los Carruajes, Bocha by Narda Lepes at the Palermo polo grounds and Mercat Caballito.

Visit now because: While BA retains its title as the world’s meat mecca, a dynamic plant-based food movement is now in full swing. Hot veggie restaurant openings include Chui, Marti and Amador Cantina over the past year.

The big numbers: This city sure likes to go out. With 92 percent of locals raving about BA’s food and drink, 88 percent lauding its arts scene and 86 percent celebrating its nightlife, BA remains a resolutely buzzy place to be. —Sorrel Moseley-Williams

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Birmingham

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22. Birmingham

What makes us great: Diverse and dynamic, Birmingham never stands still. The host of this year’s Commonwealth Games takes gold when it comes to buzzing bars, Michelin-star restaurants, world-class museums, top shopping, meandering canals, green spaces, groundbreaking music, elite sport and vibrant culture. From the graffiti-strewn streets of Digbeth (once the stomping ground of the infamous Peaky Blinders), to the hive of creativity that is the Jewellery Quarter, this former workshop of the world has reinvented itself as a global city, where people of all cultures flock to thrive and flourish. ‘Mek yerself at home, bab,’ as the Brummies say.

Visit now because: The 2022 Commonwealth Games will herald a colourful collision of top-tier sport and diverse cultures, and Birmingham is banging it out the park with festivals, live performances and exciting cultural events.

The big numbers: A whopping 92 percent of Brummies described their city as diverse – the third highest in the world. Birmingham is also a great city for expressing who you are (78 percent said so) and ranks among the UK cities least likely to be described as expensive. —James Brennan

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Stockholm

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23. Stockholm

What makes us great: History oozes from the Swedish capital’s postcard-perfect cobbled medieval squares, spice-hued Art Deco apartment blocks, and former factories converted into music and arts venues. But Stockholm is also a fast-growing cosmopolitan metropolis with a strong economy and a vision for a high-tech eco-friendly future (little wonder it was the city most likely to be described as sustainable in this year’s Index). You can enjoy a rooftop cocktail, sample the latest fusion food trends or take one of the city’s public e-bikes for a spin. Or slow down with a waterfront stroll, a smooth ferry trip out to the archipelago or a picnic in one of Stockholm’s ample green spaces.

Visit now because: The co-owner of legendary Stockholm open-air club Trädgården has just launched Eden, a new alfresco DJs-and-dining concept in the Kungsholmen district. You can’t beat the view at the top of the 102-metre-high Sjöstaden Skybar, which opened at the top of the city’s latest glass-fronted landmark Sthlm 01 last year. Meanwhile, the new Avicii Experience offers an interactive exhibition that celebrates one of Sweden’s biggest music icons.

The big numbers: Seventy-eight percent of Stockholmers told us they considered their city sustainable – the highest in the world. It also came top for green space (with 95 percent saying they’ve got easy access) and was the city least likely to be described as dirty. —Maddy Savage

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Tokyo

Photograph: Shutterstock/Sean Pavone

24. Tokyo

What makes us great: Tokyo is very much an all-rounder. Having the most Michelin stars in the world means it’s great for food and drink (something 91 percent of locals highlighted in this year’s survey). Plus, with its vibrant bar and nightlife scene, Tokyo will give you a serious case of out-out fomo. It came as no surprise to us that the city was named the second most popular travel destination for 2022, with 12 percent of all those surveyed saying the Japanese capital is number one on their bucket list.

Visit now because: Tokyo’s traditional yokocho (alleyways crammed with tiny restaurants and bars) culture is going through a renaissance, with the concept being reimagined as contemporary food halls – one of the city’s best even houses a small-batch gin distillery in a business-district skyscraper.

The big numbers: Tokyo’s public transport network might seem like a bit of a maze to outsiders, but it suits Tokyoites just fine – 94 percent said it’s easy to get around the city, the third best in the world. —Lim Chee Wah, Time Out Tokyo

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San Francisco

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25. San Francisco

What makes us great: After a long two years of closures, San Francisco is pretty much back to normal – it even has some upgrades, like an abundance of outdoor seating options built during the pandemic. Visiting SF not only means killer dining spots, from hole-in-the-wall joints to some of the best Michelin-star restaurants in the world, but also endless options for hiking, wine tasting, beach hangs, day trips and dispensary shopping. And with its reputation of being a welcoming place for all, it’s no surprise SF was voted the most progressive city in the world in this year’s survey (and also scored highly for ease of ’expressing who you are’).

Visit now because: Don’t miss brand-new national park destination, the Presidio Tunnel Tops, comprising 14 acres of parkland overlooking both the city and Golden Gate Bridge. The project opens on July 17.

The big numbers: Seventy-three percent of San Franciscans described their city progressive – more than anywhere else in the world. This was backed up by huge numbers also saying the Golden City has plenty of green space (83 percent said so) and that it’s easy to express who you are (also 83 percent).  —Clara Hogan, Time Out San Francisco

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Delhi

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26. Delhi

What makes us great: Delhi has always been forward-looking yet firmly rooted in history – a spirit that’s reflected in today’s burgeoning culinary and cultural landscape. There’s a strong focus on contemporary regional Indian cooking, coupled with a revived interest in the city’s freshly restored heritage spaces. The result? Rooftop cocktails with views of the twelfth-century Qutub Minar. Sunday farmers’ markets at the tomb-studded Sunder Nursery. And possibly the best public transport network in the country – the Delhi Metro – linking the capital’s top spots.

Visit now because: Innovative craft cocktails featuring homegrown gins and distinctly Indian ingredients are shaking up the city’s bar scene. Try Sidecar, which featured on last year’s World’s 50 Best Bars list, and Perch Wine & Coffee Bar.

The big numbers: Think of Delhi and you’re probably thinking of the city’s sprawling bazaars and endless tasty nosh – and quite right, too. An impressive 91 percent of Delhiites applauded their city’s food and drink options. —Malavika Bhattacharya

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Toronto

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27. Toronto

What makes us great: After multiple lockdowns, Toronto has come alive again. This highly resilient city survived a long winter of heated outdoor patios, and now the food and drink scene is once again bustling as new restaurants, cafés and shops open up seemingly every week. In this year’s Index, the city scored highly for progressiveness and community spirit, which can be felt in the activism, community events and the thriving underground nightlife scene that’s back in full force for the summer.

Visit now because: Toronto’s diverse food scene has everything from French bistro brunch to a new Ossington salad hotspot and can’t-miss summer festivals (hello, Caribana!) that bring in droves of gourmets.

The big numbers: A massive 95 percent of respondents in Toronto described their city as diverse – the highest in the world. Eighty percent also said it was easy to ‘express who you are’ in the city. —Lydia Hrycko

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Lisbon

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28. Lisbon

What makes us great: Terrace culture has always been big in Lisbon, but it feels like there are more alfresco bars and restaurants here than ever right now. Perch by the river or hit up one of the miradouro viewpoints to get a feel for what we mean – you’ll hear glasses clinking on every corner. Elsewhere, new restaurants are seemingly popping up all over the city, offering the best of local and global cuisine (no wonder 92 percent of locals said the city’s food and drink scene is thriving in 2022) while a crop of new bars will serve you the chicest cocktails around.

Visit now because: Restaurants... with dance floors? Bars... with excellent food menus? So-called ‘hybrid venues’ where you can grab dinner, stay for drinks and then have a boogie are really taking off in Lisbon. Descarado in Alcântara and Tricky’s in Cais do Sodré are two of the best.

The big numbers: On top of that solid food and drink rating, a notable 73 percent of Lisboetas described their city as beautiful. Too right. —Steffany Casanova, Time Out Lisbon

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Boston

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29. Boston

What makes us great: Cliché it may be, but Boston really does have something for everyone. Rock your favourite outfit and head to a burlesque show at Midway Café or grab a boozy slushie at queer institution Club Café. The food scene will delight you with everything from fresh cannoli and fluffy injera bread to local craft beer. Warmer months are a perfect time to explore the Common or even take a swan boat ride.

Visit now because: The summer is the ideal time to scope out the vintage market that takes place weekly in Copley Square. Cool off with a beer and oat milk soft serve at the newly opened Plant Pub.

The big numbers: This city is rather lovely to look at, so it’s fortunate locals consider it a very easy place to traipse around, with 79 percent of respondents describing the city as walkable. The same percentage also rated the city highly for art and culture. —Megan Hennessey

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Mexico City

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30. Mexico City

What makes us great: Mexico may have remained largely open to travellers during the pandemic, but only now is the capital starting feel busy again. That should surprise no one. After all, CDMX has the best bar scene in North America, endless amazing live music and, very soon, it will be home to one of the world’s largest aquariums. A new museum arrives practically every year, and the city’s diverse food scene offers a veritable world tour.

Visit now because: Some of the world’s finest cocktails can be found at Café de Nadie, Handshake Speakeasy, Limantour, Baltra, Kaito and Hanky Panky. Anyone up for a bar crawl?

The big numbers: A whopping 92 percent of locals said they rated the city’s art and culture, with 90 percent saying they appreciate the variety of things to do. Say what you will about CDMX, it certainly ain’t dull. —Mauricio Nava, Time Out Mexico City

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Tel Aviv

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31. Tel Aviv

What makes us great: Coming out after two years of Covid, Tel Aviv has embraced new concepts. Some of the best things in TLV are free – like yoga sessions at Gordon Pool on the marina, night buses on Shabbat (the weekend) and open-air gigs in the summer. Named the second funnest city in the world in this year’s Index, Tel Aviv brims with pop-up shops, bars and art galleries, often set in old Bauhaus buildings. While the new light rail and skyscrapers point to the future, the city still has that raw Middle Eastern spice.

Visit now because: There’s a new crop of restaurants in town, including Tirza (from the esteemed team behind OCD), George and John in Jaffa’s iconic Drisco Hotel, and Fed and Bev, which fuses tapas and Thai cuisine with live music.

The big numbers: Just pipped to top spot by Chicago, Tel Aviv is still considered fun by a massive 78 percent of locals. And that isn’t all. According to the Index, Tel Aviv is also mighty good for food and drink (93 percent said so). —Dan Savery Raz

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Paris

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32. Paris

What makes us great: Paris isn’t just the historic city of Haussmanian blocks and café terraces you’ll find on postcards and fridge magnets the world over. This is also a place in the midst of change. It may have been named the best city in the world for art, culture and museums once again in our survey, but the French capital’s programming is becoming ever-more inclusive and diverse, with the feminist art movement riding particularly high. Elsewhere, natural wine bars are pushing out the stuffy caves of yore, and the city is becoming as well known for its street food as for its Michelin stars. Shame, then, that locals still consider the city the least friendly in the world (at least according to our poll).

Visit now because: After two pretty bleak years for the city’s nightlife scene, clubs are popping up in all sorts of unlikely places, including under the Périphérique ringroad. Our faves are Virage, a gigantic space in a former car pound, and Périph, now the city’s biggest open-air club (with capacity for 3,500 partygoers).

The big numbers: A whopping 97 percent of Parisians said their city was a good place to see art and culture – making it the best in the world for the second year running. It also came third when asked people anywhere which one city they’d like to travel to in 2022. — Houssine Bouchama, Time Out Paris

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Kuala Lumpur

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33. Kuala Lumpur

What makes us great: Everyone in and around Kuala Lumpur has always known our food is tops, which is why it wasn’t much of a surprise that the city scored highly on eating and drinking in this year’s Index. From soul-nourishing hawker food to creative fine dining and experimental bars, KL’s diverse cultural makeup begets an equally varied culinary scene. Even more welcome is the city’s burgeoning arts scene, which has grown over the past few years and exploded post-lockdown. Whether it’s fine art, theatre, music or spoken word, there’s never been a better time to discover local talent. Now, if only we could fix the traffic downtown…

Visit now because: It’s impossible not to have a good night out here. Try Nadodi for fine Indian food, Bar Trigona for honey cocktails and Jao Tim in Chinatown for live jazz.

The big numbers: A frankly phenomenal 94 percent of Index respondents in KL went wild for the city’s food and drink. Seventy-seven percent described their city as diverse, while 62 percent praised its community spirit. —Florentyna Leow

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Manila

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34. Manila

What makes us great: Manila gets bad rap for chaos – from overpopulation to epic traffic jams. Do as the locals do and embrace the anarchy, even for just a couple of days before jetting off to one of the Philippines’ more than 7,000 idyllic islands. The legacy of Chinese, Spanish and American influences makes Manila an underrated hub for art and culture, with unique customs and cuisine to boot. The pandemic brought the longest lockdowns, cruel liquor bans and the demand for spacewear-like face shields, but a strong vaccine drive has helped this megacity stay afloat. Manila was voted the third most resilient in this year’s survey, and not a single respondent described the city as rude – instead, it was admired by many for the welcoming and infectious smiles of its people.

Visit now because: The city really is thriving again. Let Manila entertain you as it has before with its high-end shopping malls, eclectic contemporary art galleries and the edgy music venues of the south.

The big numbers: One hundred percent of respondents in Manila didn’t describe locals as rude, making it the least rude city in this year’s Index. Sixty percent said that the city was resilient, while 78 percent raved about its nightlife and party scene. —Shirin Bhandari

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Athens

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35. Athens

What makes us great: Where else in the world can you find vibrant rooftop bars overlooking temples built by ancient civilisations; dazzling beaches a mere 20 minutes away. Add to that the seemingly endless flurry of new openings: trendy boutique hotels popping up on almost every central street; restaurants specialising in everything from tacos to croissants; ultra-cool bars perfect for cooling down on a summer evening – each is helping Athens become as well known for its present-day creative energy as for its history.

Visit now because: Summer is when the city comes alive. Pack a picnic and head to SNFCC for free movies under the stars, or drink, dine and sleep at 2022’s hottest new hotel-restaurant combo: Estiatoria Milos at Xenodocheio Milos.

The big numbers: Not only did ninety-one percent of Athenians laud their city’s food and drink and 80 percent speak out in favour of its nightlife, but they generally think it’s pretty cheap, too. Seventy-seven percent didn’t describe the Greek capital as expensive, making it the third least expensive city in this year’s Index.  —Katie Silcox

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Dublin

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36. Dublin

What makes us great: A vibrant, welcoming and compact city with a pub culture that bars across the world could only dream of replicating... Dublin really is one of a kind. Whether it’s Brogan’s, Hogan’s or Grogan’s (believe us, there’s a BIG difference), you’re guaranteed to finish the night with some new friends who will make you feel as though the Irish capital is your home. There are few cities where you’ll find beach crowds running into the sea come rain or shine, mountains with picturesque views of a low-rise city, buzzing streets with buskers and a drool-worthy food scene – but our city has the lot.

Visit now because: With new Michelin-star restaurants including Liath and Variety Jones, the tastiest Korean chicken from Chimac, burgers from BuJo and pizza from PI, Dublin offers something to satisfy any craving.

The big numbers: Not only did a measly 10 percent of Dubliners describe their city as rude, but a good 71 percent said it was an actively friendly place – making it the third friendliest city in this year’s Index. That old Irish charm, eh? —Éadaoin Fitzmaurice

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São Paulo

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37. São Paulo

What makes us great: Don’t believe what they say over in Rio about people from São Paulo. It’s true that the industrious Paulistanos work hard, but they party even harder and there’s a scene for everybody in the clubbing capital of South America. The food here is some of the best on the continent too: decades of immigration have woven cooking traditions from Italy, Japan and more into cosmopolitan São Paulo’s culinary tapestry.

Visit now because: São Paulo’s LGBTQ+ community is bigger and bolder than ever: an estimated four million attended the city’s pride parade in June this year, making it the largest in the world.

The big numbers: A near-faultless 95 percent of Paulistanos said their city’s food and drink is on point, with 86 percent also praising its nightlife. —Dougie Loynes

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Miami

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38. Miami

What makes us great: Miami is hot right now (and not just temperature-wise!) A recent influx of tourists and transplants has raised its profile, attracting inspectors from the Michelin Guide for the very first Florida guide, globally renowned entertainers (Bad Bunny is opening his first restaurant here) and world-class sports events, from the Formula 1 Grand Prix to the 2026 World Cup. It seems like everyone wants to be in Miami these days and we don’t blame them.

Visit now because: The aforementioned Michelin Guide is hot off the presses and you’ll want to be first in line to try Miami’s finest restaurants, including contemporary American from a Top Chef-winning chef (who’s also got a spot at Time Out Market) and wildly inventive Cuban food.

The big numbers: Vice City was described as fun by 72 percent of respondents and beautiful by 74 percent. When it comes to food and drink, 93 percent of Miamians had something positive to say about their city. —Virginia Gil, Time Out Miami

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Barcelona

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39. Barcelona

What makes us great: As you’ll no doubt have clocked, everyone is heading to Barcelona right now. Whether or not it’s just the summer festival rush, we reckon the city is only going to get busier over the coming months. And that’s great. This city is only really itself when the bars and restaurants and beaches fill up, and stay that way from dawn till dusk. The city came fourth when we asked which one city Time Out readers would like to move to, taking 6 percent of all votes. No doubt the influencers (@moyamawhinney, @best.dressed among them) who’ve flocked here recently have had something to do with it. But the city’s perennial charms – culture, gastronomy, the heat – have surely helped too.

Visit now because: The cocktail scene must be among Europe’s finest. Venues like Paradiso, Two Schmucks and Sips are all world class, and it should come as no surprise that the World’s Best Bars gala is being held here later this year.

The big numbers: Locals rarely get bored here (94 percent of Index respondents didn’t describe their city as boring) and they also think their neighbours are pretty decent (just 11 percent described their fellow Barcelonians as rude). —María-José Gómez, Time Out Barcelona

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Dubai

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40. Dubai

What makes us great: Dubai has all the stuff you’d want from a travel destination – from incredible restaurants and buzzing nightlife to some of the world’s best shopping and simply stunning beaches. What’s more, it’s modern, clean, super-safe and very easy to get around. This is a city of superlatives – take a selfie at the top of the world’s tallest building, swim in the world’s highest infinity pool and skydive over the world’s largest manmade island, all in one day.

Visit now because: The newly opened Museum of the Future is not only worth visiting in its own right, but also has a hidden viewing deck that few people know about. Follow it up with a beach club crawl along the rapidly expanding Palm West strip and a DJ set at Electric Pawn Shop.

The big numbers: Dubai was named one of the cleanest cities in the world, with 97 percent of locals saying it wasn’t dirty. And that’s not all – 83 percent described it as safe, too. —Louise Charlesworth, Time Out Dubai

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Rome

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41. Rome

What makes us great: After two years of restrictions, Rome is back — and the city’s cultural programming is better than ever. Whether you opt to walk through the Colosseum by moonlight to avoid the crowds, catch an opera in the third-century Baths of Caracalla, or watch a movie al fresco on the tiny Tiber Island, the Eternal City offers a plethora of original experiences in unforgettable settings. After a day of exploring, make like the Romans and head up to one of the city’s many rooftop bars to admire the skyline at sunset: Alto is a new addition which pairs craft cocktails with gourmet bites a short walk from the Vatican.

Visit now because: Natural wine is everywhere in Rome these days. The brand-new Vinificio in Testaccio has more than 500 international labels set across a large industrial space, while Enoteca l’Antidoto in Trastevere is a cosy spot that sells wine by the bottle along with creative small plates.

The big numbers: With nearly 3,000 years of history under its belt, it’s no surprise that 91 percent of Index respondents in Rome lauded the city’s art, culture and museums. Eight-four percent also think it’s beautiful. —Livia Hengel

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Los Angeles

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42. Los Angeles

What makes us great: Life in L.A. may be increasingly and uncomfortably hot and dry, but the breezy Mediterranean vibes still persist on the dinner plate thanks to the rise of crudo-forward and tapas-inspired spots, including Bar Moruno and Causita. The rapidly recovering dining scene reflects a range of cuisines as diverse as L.A.’s population, and that applies outside of the culinary world, too, as art shows and live music rebound with progressive purpose – and a signature weirdness that we’re glad to welcome back to the city’s again-brimming social calendar.

Visit now because: The Academy Museum wraps up its first year with major gallery refreshes and an exhibition on pre-1970s Black cinema, while the Broad has rolled out shows on Takashi Murakami and the American flag plus a new reservation process for Yayoi Kusama’s Infinity Mirrored Room. 

The big numbers: Ninety percent of LA residents spoke out in favour of the city’s food and drink and 87 percent lauded its variety of things to do. An impressive 87 percent also described the City of Angels as diverse.  —Michael Juliano, Time Out Los Angeles

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Accra

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43. Accra

What makes us great: Accra will reliably give you a good time. In the Ghanaian capital, the party either lasts until 8am or simply never ends. The array of delectable traditional foods to try is never-ending, and the eclectic Afrobeats sounds, seasonal cultural festivals and bold festive attire point to the city’s rich history. And community is important here. ‘Your business is everyone’s business’ is how many locals would put it. Accra’s warmth makes it nearly impossible to leave without establishing genuine connections (in fact, the city was named the third easiest city to make friends in, according to our survey).

Visit now because: Every week, there’s something new to discover on the city’s nightlife circuit. Club 69 is a recent favourite, and the capital’s first non-alcoholic bar is set to open soon, too.

The big numbers: Sixty-eight percent of locals said it’s easy to make friends here, with 63 percent saying it’s easy to get to know your neighbours. Just 2 percent would describe the city as rude. —Christina Jane

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Singapore

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44. Singapore

What makes us great: Though we may be a small city, you’re never short on great stuff to do in Singapore. Almost anywhere on the island is accessible via public transport (something 92 percent of locals praised in this year’s Index) – but because it’s essentially summer all year long here, you’d do just as well to explore on foot and soak up some rays. Lately, Singaporeans have also started getting serious about wellness and relaxation, with many spending their weekends in the city’s beautiful parks, and also partaking in things like sound baths and sound therapy.

Visit now because: The city is back to its usual fun-loving self. People are dining out again, there are new openings every week and late nights are back with a vengeance. Lately, the Time Out team have enjoyed the food at Native, just around the corner from our office. Think elevated Singaporean cuisine with a cheeky twist.

The big numbers: Singapore was named the safest city in the world, with a massive 96 percent of locals saying their city was safe in our survey. Considering just how little space the city has, it’s also impressive that 78 percent of respondents noted the ease with which they can access green space and nature. —Delfina Utomo, Time Out Singapore

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Abu Dhabi

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45. Abu Dhabi

What makes us great: Not only is Abu Dhabi the capital of the UAE, it’s the unofficial arts and culture capital, too. The city is known for being safe, clean and relaxing – as locals made very clear in this year’s Index – which may well be why it’s so popular among expat families. You’re never short of exciting things to do here from cutting-edge restaurant openings to major new museums including the Guggenheim Abu Dhabi and the National History Museum Abu Dhabi (both coming soon).

Visit now because: Yas Bay Waterfront and Al Qana are the latest neighbourshoods to open up with cafés and restaurants aplenty. Al Qana is also home to the National Aquarium, which is the largest in the Middle East.

The big numbers: Not only is Abu Dhabi one of the safest cities in this year’s Index (with 92 percent of locals praising this aspect of life in the city), it also ranks among the least dirty, stressful and rude. In short, it’s an all-round comfortable and pleasant place to live and work. —Heather Cichowski, Time Out Abu Dhabi

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Sydney

Photograph: Destination NSW

46. Sydney

What makes us great: The world-famous architecture of our most recognisable building aside, it’s the natural wonders Sydney boasts that really make the city a must-visit. With more than 100 beaches, thousands of hectares of National Parklands surrounding the urban sprawl and the largest natural harbour in the world, few other cities can rival it for sheer jaw-dropping beauty. And thanks to the city’s waterfront restaurants, rooftop and high-rise bars and attractions like the Harbour Bridge Climb, you can always enjoy Mother Nature’s eye candy with a drink or a bite in hand.

Visit now because: Sydney is in the midst of a hospitality boom as the city bounces back from 2021’s rolling lockdowns. A number of new high-end hospitality precincts have created one-stop solutions for a great night out, with collections of bars and restaurants conveniently gathered on the same footprint for your drinking and dining pleasure.

The big numbers: Not only is Sydney beautiful, it’s pristine, too. Seventy-one percent of Sydneyites described the city as beautiful, while just 11 percent said it was dirty. On top of that, 80 percent said they could go walking in nature with ease. —Maxim Boon, Time Out Sydney

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Auckland

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47. Auckland

What makes us great: Auckland might be New Zealand’s largest city but it still brims with natural beauty. It’s just as easy to hike up volcanoes or ferry-hop to islands as it is to order local wines at buzzy city-centre bars. No wonder Auckland scored highly for relaxation and ‘taking a walk in nature or a green space’ in this year’s Index. It also got a nod for diversity: recognition of the many cultural influences that have shaped the city, and are best explored through the city’s exceptional dining scene.

Visit now because: Top chefs are redefining New Zealand cuisine through native ingredients, and Māori and Pacific influences. Discover fresh takes on the taste of Aotearoa at Peter Gordon’s Homeland, Michael Meredith’s Mr Morris and Ben Bayly’s Ahi.

The big numbers: According to this year’s poll, the NZ city is incredibly easy to relax in – enormous 86 percent of respondents said so, the second most of any city in the world. It’s also easy to take a walk in nature or a green space (say 94 percent of Aucklanders). —Petrina Darrah

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Rio de Janeiro

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48. Rio de Janeiro

What makes us great: Rio is known as the cidade maravilhosa (marvellous city), and while that may sound immodest, what other city boasts such a wealth of stunning natural features? Dramatic rocky peaks tower over wildlife-packed forests, lagoons and golden beaches. Indeed, Rio scored highly this year for beauty, ‘hooking up with people’ and ‘making new friends’, and by night, that warm welcome comes to the fore as the city’s countless bars, street parties and samba clubs open up. Bring a smile and an easygoing attitude – in moments you’ll have made a host of new friends, ready to help you enjoy everything a night out in this vibrant city has to offer.

Visit now because: During the days of the pandemic restrictions, Rio put its party spirit on hold, but now it has returned with a vengeance. And in the downtime, many of the beachside kiosks and rooftop bars have been upgraded, offering better food, drinks and music.

The big numbers: Rio is the third best city in the world for hook-ups (66 percent of citizens said it’s easy to get with someone here), while 74 percent said their hometown was beautiful and 70 percent said they had easy access to green space. —Tom Le Mesurier

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Johannesburg

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49. Johannesburg

What makes us great: Johannesburg is a city full of life and possibilities. It’s a place where South Africans come for opportunities, which makes it incredibly diverse – people from all types of backgrounds come and live life together here. The nightlife is phenomenal, with clubs and pubs from the city to the township. And thanks to the melting pot of the surrounding ’burbs, the city’s restaurants offer up an exquisite taste of the wider world.

Visit now because: Outdoor markets are booming. Our fave is the Fourways Farmers Market – here you’ll find gourmet street food, tip-top cocktails and very good live music. The ideal place to start the weekend.

The big numbers: A remarkable 80 percent of Joburg respondents said their city was diverse. While the city came dead last for walkability – just 4 percent of Joburg residents reckon the city can be navigated easily on foot – 77 percent said they had easy access to nature and green space. —Thando Mpembe

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Istanbul

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50. Istanbul

What makes us great: Despite political uncertainties – and a terrible economic downturn – it didn’t take long for Istanbul to shake off its Covid blues and return to its energetic self. As always, the city’s culinary scene is brimming with surprises, notably thanks to a recent influx of refugees from Syria and Iran. The launch of the city’s first Michelin guide also generated a wave of excitement within the industry. Add to that the 17th Istanbul Biennale and countless big musical events, and you must have one of the world’s most exciting cities right now.

Visit now because: Following years of turmoil the iconic Ataturk Kultur Merkezi is once again open with a bold programme of opera, theatre, concerts and film screenings. One other significant opening of 2022 was Galata Port, the huge redevelopment of the historic Karaköy waterfront, crowned by Renzo Piano’s new Istanbul Modern museum.

The big numbers: Ninety-seven percent of Istanbulites didn’t say their city was boring, while 82 percent said it was great for food and drink and 83 percent thought it was diverse. —Seda Pekçelen, Time Out Istanbul

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Bangkok

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51. Bangkok

What makes us great: For a city reliant on tourism, Bangkok soldiered through the past couple of years without so much as a whimper, adapting to the new normal while opening hot restaurants, coffee shops and hotels. Unlike many capitals across the globe, its residents did not leave in droves (perhaps thanks to the affordability of living in BKK) and the city continued to tick, hosting festivals, fairs and gallery openings. Finally, nightlife looks set to return in earnest, now that restrictions to venue opening hours have finally been lifted, easing the City of Angels back into full swing.

Visit now because: The food scene is remarkably vibrant with recently opened Kin Kub Koi for seafood, fine-dining restaurant Maze and Thai-Chinese fusion spot Restaurant Potong all making serious waves. Plus, coffee connoisseurs will rejoice at Piccolo Vicolo Café in Ratchathewi.

The big numbers: The Thai capital’s food and drink scene reigns supreme. An enormous 86 percent of Bangkokians say their city is a great place to eat and drink. —Lucie Grace

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Hong Kong

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52. Hong Kong

What makes us great: Hong Kong has been rocked by protests and the pandemic, but the city remains resilient. While Hong Kong has been closed off to the world for two years, its food and drink scene has kept evolving. You’ll find everything here from hole-in-the-walls to Michelin-starred restaurants, as well as many of the region’s most-awarded drinking dens. With the opening of massive contemporary art museum M+ and the Hong Kong Palace Museum, and events like Art Basel and Art Central finally held in person this year, Hong Kong is cementing its status as one of the world’s leading art capitals.

Visit now because: The food and drink scene is popping off. Grab a meal at the newly opened Heimat and Agora, then wind down with a drink at innovative bar Argo or omakase-style Mostly Harmless.

The big numbers: Public transport doesn’t get much better than in Hong Kong, with 92 percent of respondents praising the city’s transit system. For such a dense city, fresh air also isn’t too far away – 72 percent of Hong Kongers said they had good access to nature or green space. —Tatum Ancheta, Time Out Hong Kong

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Doha

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53. Doha

What makes us great: Ask anyone why they love living in Doha, and they’ll no doubt bring up how clean the place is (in fact, in this year’s Index, a whopping 87 percent of respondents said so). But more importantly, there’s loads of great stuff to see and do here, whether you fancy heading out to one of the city’s many cafés for breakfast (and we mean many, Doha’s coffee-and-cake culture is absolutely thriving), touring public art spots from Al Sadd Metro Station to Katara Cultural Village, or visiting a bar after hours. Pull up a chair, tuck into a French toast and embrace the slower (and less stressful!) pace of life Doha offers.

Visit now because: As Qatar prepares to host the World Cup in November, the city’s already brilliant art scene is about to get even better. Between now and the end of the year, 17 new exhibitions are set to open, including ‘Forever Valentino’. The immersive light installation from Pipiliotti Rist at the National Museum of Qatar (which opened back in March) is particularly stunning.

The big numbers: As well as rating the city highly for cleanliness, locals think life in the city is generally pretty stress-free (just 18 percent said it was a stressful place to be). —Dianne Apen-Sadler, Time Out Doha

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