Rue des Francs-Bourgeois (2)

Before we are leaving rue des Francs-Bourgeois, there are two other buildings to which I would like to draw some attention.

One of them is the Crédit Municipal de Paris (no. 55). This is one of the oldest financial institutions in France, created in 1777, which among other things acts as a pawnshop – it will (possibly) lend you money in exchange for a deposit of some more or less valuable merchandise, and when you (possibly) can pay back, they will return your belongings. This kind of institution has several nick names, like “Mont-de-Piété” (after a charitable Italian institution, “Monte-de-Pietà”). Another name for it is “Chez ma Tante” (“At my Auntie”); normally you would not too openly admit that you had to borrow from this institution, you would more easily pretend that you got some money from your auntie. Another version for this expression is that one of the royal princes did not want his mother to find out that he had pawned his watch, so he just said that he had forgotten it at his aunt’s house. The place has still 600 visitors per day and a lot of famous personalities have passed the gate – in the past even Victor Hugo, Emile Zola, Claude Monet... When the not reclaimed belongings are later auctioned, you can make some good business here.

An additional interesting thing can be found in the court yard: The trace of the 13th century Philippe-Auguste city wall (which we have already followed in a number of posts). The other building I wanted to mention is the “Hôtel de Soubise” (no. 60), built in the beginning of the 18th century (top picture). It replaced another mansion built during the 13th century and which during the 15th century became the residence of the Guise family, fervent Catholics, and this was where e.g. the Saint Bartholomew”s Day massacre was planned (1572), leading to the death of thousands of Huguenots. You can still see the old entrance to the previous building on the back side (bottom right picture on the below patchwork). The present building was in 1808 (Napoleon again) taken over by the French state and is since the place for (today, part of) the National Archives and also a museum. Only here – and in adjacent buildings - are today stored some 100 km (60 miles) of documents, the oldest form the 7th century. When walking along this street at lunch time together with a friend on our way from Place des Vosges, we made a small deviation, turned to the left at rue Vieille du Temple and found (at no. 30) a small restaurant, "Au Petit Fer à Cheval" (the Small Horse Shoe). The menu and the place looked nice, so we decided to give it a try. I can now say that it was nice. The restaurant dates from 1903, the marble-topped bar in the entrance has the shape of a horse shoe and behind the bar there is room for maybe twenty guests. The restaurant has obviously at a certain moment been restored with some type of 1925 decoration, but it all gives a very authentic impression, the waiters look like the waiters used to look like, the place got full and I believe only with more or less regular guests! Traditional dishes, nice atmosphere and reasonable prices! Some of these pictures can be found on my photo blog.

Before “closing” for the weekend, I wished to show some more details from the Paris spring development (photos from yesterday). Have a nice weekend!

Rue des Francs-Bourgeois (1)

On your way from Place de Vosges to e.g. Centre Pompidou, you could take rue des Francs-Bourgeois, which is the central and a very ancient street in the “le Marais “ area. There is a lot to see also in the crossing and neighbouring streets, but today – and tomorrow – we will just follow this one.

The name of the street, which means “exempt citizens”, was given during the Revolution and because of the existence of a mansion in the street where in the 15th century some poor people who didn’t have to pay taxes to the city were given a place to live.

Along the street you will find a large number of mansions (“hôtels particuliers”), most of them several hundred years old. Many of them are closed to public – today mostly occupied by different administrations - and you can only with a bit of luck see what is behind the gates and the facades. One of the nicer mansions and open to public is Hôtel Carnavalet (see below), built in 1548, which used to be the home of Madame Sévigné (her birthplace was Place des Vosges, as I mentioned yesterday). It’s today the Museum of the History of Paris. It’s certainly worth a visit (free of charge), is magnificently decorated (to a great part with interiors from different epochs and often coming from other palaces) and shows a lot of interesting documentation. The street is full of boutiques – often old bakeries or butchers which, fortunately, in some cases have kept the old ensigns and part of the decoration. Here almost everything is open even on Sundays, so it’s a nice shopping street. ... and if you are hungry or thirsty, you will easily find a place. I always advise you to look to the right and the left, into the small side streets, alleys and inner yards (when they are open); this is what adds to the charm of many of these old streets. As an example, if you look on the lower left corner of the below patchwork, you can see an alley, called “Impasse des Arbalétriers” (arbalète = cross-bow) where in 1407 the brother of King Charles VI was killed, which led to about 15 years of civil war, or at least brutal struggle, between the “Armagnacs” and the “Burgundians”.

As usual, you can find these pictures "full size" on my photo blog.

Place des Vosges

We are now in the area called “le Marais” and will start with a look at the central place, Place des Vosges. Here used to be a royal residence (Hôtel des Tournelles) with a garden where the king Henry II was killed in a tourney in 1559, after which his widow, Catherine de Medicis, got the building destroyed.

Henry IV decided to build a square, which was finished in 1612 (after his death) and then became a very fashionable place, originally called Place Royale. It got its present name, Place des Vosges, in 1799 to honor the first French provincial department to pay taxes to support the Revolutionary army.The place looks a bit empty and dull on the pictures I took last week; as a comparison you can see a photo I took last summer.

It’s a true square, 140 x 140 meters (460 x 460 ft), all the buildings are in the same style with the same design and measures, except two pavilions with slightly higher roofs, designated as the King’s and the Queen’s pavilions. No king or queen ever lived here, but a lot of aristocracy and other prominent people. Among those, you can mention Sully, Cardinal Richelieu, Madame de Sevigné, Victor Hugo, Théophile Gautier, Alphonse Daudet...

Under the arcades you find today a number of art galleries, shops and a few cafés and in the middle of the place you can find a statue of Louis XIII - the original one was melted down during the Revolution and replaced in 1825.Behind no. 9, where you find the top restaurant “l’Ambroisie”, you will find another open garden or square (the gate is normally open). It’s surrounded by the Hôtel de Chaulnes and the Hôtel Sully, today housing respectively the Academy of Architecture and the “Caisse nationale des Monuments Historiques”. As usual, some of these pictures can be found on my photo blog.

I made an extra post today - see below!!

Grands Boulevards (2)

Let’s continue the walk along the Grands Boulevards, this time from Place de la République about half way to the end point, the Madeleine Church. We will follow the boulevards St. Martin, St. Denis, Bonne Nouvelle, Poissonière and Montmartre. (You can find maps on the previous posts.)

First I would like to show some normal street views, day and night. We are now approaching the part of the boulevards that still today offer some real nightlife with theatres, cinemas, restaurants…A few facades were there already when the boulevards were opened after 1670.There are a number of theatres along these boulevards, most of them from the 19th century. Sarah Bernhardt played and directed as well at Théatre de la Renaissance as at Théatre de la Porte Saint Martin (the middle top photo), where also Edmond Rostand presented the Cyrano de Bergerac. At the as a historic monument classified Théatre des Variétés (the photo to the right) a number of Offenbach’s comic operas were performed for the first time.I have already referred to the perhaps most famous Paris - and Europe’s biggest - cinema, Rex, inaugurated in 1932 as some kind of “Radio City Hall”. The main theatre can house some 2800 people and is not only used for films, but often for concerts.Along our walk we will also see two Arches of Triumph, Saint Martin and Saint Denis, both built under the reign and to the glory of Louis XIV. They were then on the border of Paris, on the way you then entered Paris from the north via rue Saint Denis (see post January 3) or rue Saint Martin. There are some nice and typical Paris streets to the right and to the left of the boulevards…… and you can also find some interesting pedestrian passageways:

Passage Prado, opened already in 1785, but covered only in 1925. Today it houses a number of Indian, Pakistani and Afro type of shops, hairdressing salons, a hotel… Passage Jouffroy, neighbour to our Mme Tussauds (Musée Grévin), created in 1847, with more fashionable shops, hotels…Passage des Panoramas, the most elegant of the three, in its present shape there since 1834 with some very old shops, restaurants…and neighbour to Théatre des Variétés, meaning that it was especially in fashion during the glorious Offenbach years (see above).Pissarro made a number of paintings from a hotel room at Boulevard Montmartre.

One small curiosity: When I looked closer on the photo of the street sign of Boulevard St. Martin, I noted a number of bullet impacts, obviously quite fresh, not yet rusty!

And tomorrow we make the last part of the Grands Boulevards.

Some of the above pictures can be found on my photo blog.

Place de la République

Before continuing on the boulevards, I propose a stop at Place de la République (for the plan of Paris, see preceding posts.).

This place was basically created during the second half of the 19th century. The present large buildings you can find on one side of the place replaced some theatres including the then famous “Diaporama”, where Daguerre – one of the photography inventors – presented his shows. One of the buildings was originally a big department store (Magasins Réunis) and is now occupied by a hotel and some shops. In the other large building you find the quarters of part of the Garde Républicaine (the French equivalent to the British Horse Guards).

On the opposite side of the place you can find a modest version of a pedestrian passageway, Passage Vendôme, one of many that were created around 1820-30, the forerunners to our present shopping centres.

The place is of course mostly known for the monument, “La République”, which was inaugurated - before it was quite ready - for the first official celebration of the 14th of July as a national holiday in 1880. A new inauguration took place when it was completed in 1883. It was created by two brothers Morice.

On the top, you have “Marianne”, one of the symbols of the Republic. Why Marianne? It seems to have been a popular name at the time of the Revolution among the working classes…. Why a woman? Because the Republic is feminine in French (La République) and women were perhaps also supposed to be less concerned about power and more about people’s well being…. Why the Phrygian bonnet? It was worn already by former slaves during the Roman Empire as a symbol for their citizenship….The monument is rich in decorations: You have also three sculptures representing “Liberté, égalite, fraternité”. Although “Liberty, Equality, Brotherhood (– or Death)” was an essential message already during the 1789 Revolution, it became an official motto only a few decades later. Once again these are feminine words in French and represented by women.
There is also a reference to the “Suffrage Universel”, the right for everybody to vote, established by France, as the first state in the world, in 1848. Of course, it was then limited to men only – French women had to wait until 1945!!











A last remarkable thing with the monument are 12 bronze reliefs around the base. They are made by A-J Dalou (who competed for the whole monument but instead made the monument for Place de la Nation). The reliefs tell the story of the establishment of the Republic (of course only the bright side of it). I thought that to show these reliefs in detail would be a good opportunity for me – and some of you – to memorize the major Revolutionary events. I made a separate post here below showing these reliefs with a few explaining words. I leave you the choice to look at this post as a supplement, if you have the courage.

Tomorrow we will continue with some more boulevards.

Some of the above pictures can be found on my photo blog.

Place de la République bis

Referring to the above post, here you can se the 12 reliefs by A-J Dalou, representing the major French Revolutionary events, which can be found on the base of the monument at Place de la République.

Along Rue Réaumur (1)

Still painting, but here is something which I more or less prepared end last week:

Rue Réaumur (3rd arrdt.) stretches from the Temple to our Stock Exchange (la Bourse). It was opened in different steps during the 19th century – Haussmann again. Réaumur was an 18th century scientist, today perhaps best known for the temperature scale which was widely used around Europe before being replaced by the centigrades (Celsius).

The street starts thus at the Temple, today just a square, but this is where an old fortress from 1240, later prison, used to stay. It’s particularly known for having hosted the royal family during the Revolution and Louis XVI was taken directly from here to be guillotined at the Place de la Révolution, today Place de la Concorde.

There are some interesting buildings to be seen along the street, most of them from the period 1850-1900. There are actually so many that I prefer to make only half of the street today.

Some specific words about a few of these buildings:

No. 51 used to be the first big Felix Potin shop, opened in 1860 (rebuilt in 1910). Felix Potin may not say very much to a foreigner, but it became an important chain with 1200 grocery shops all over Paris. The last one closed in 1996.

No. 82 hosted a big department store, “A Réaumur”, until 1961. The founder, J-P Gaubert-Martin somehow invented the “prêt-à-porter”, catalogues and post orders.Walking this first half way of Rue Réaumur, you cross some interesting streets, worth a small deviation. To the left you can find Rue Beaubourg and you can distinguish the modern art museum, Centre Pompidou. When you cross Rue St.Martin you can find the 15th century St.Nicolas-in-the-Fields (St.Nicolas-des-Champs) church to the left and the National Conservatory of Arts and Crafts (with museum), previously the 12th century abbey and priory of St.Martin-in-the-Fields (St.Martin-des-Champs), to the right with the St.Martin Arch of Triumph in the background. In between you can find the Jean-Paul Gaultier fashion house and a musical theatre, La Gaité Lyrique. Later you will cross Rue St.Denis, also with its Arch of Triumph – to the right - and a number of sex shops to the left.

Some of these photos can be seen on my photo blog.

(A said, I continue painting, so I don’t know when I will post next time. Excuse me also for not visiting your sites regularly.)