Cite de l'Architecture
From Paris Hotels Reviews
Cite de l'Architecture
The northern wing of the palace is occupied by the Cité de l’ Architecture et du Patrimoine (Mon, Wed & Fri noon-8pm, Thurs noon-10pm, Sat & Sun 11am-7pm; free), a combined institute, library and museum of architecture. The long and lofty Galerie des Moulages, on the ground floor, displays giant plaster casts sections of great French buildings. The basic idea – to tell the story of French architecture from the Middle Ages through to the end of eighteenth century – dates back to the 1880s, when the great restorer and antiquarian Violet-le-Duc pioneered the rescue and restoration of France’s decaying churches and monuments, and argued for a giant “museum of comparative sculpture”. Most of the moulds exhibited here were created for that very museum, which long stood on this site. To see French architecture laid out as a kind of grand historical panorama is as eye-opening now as it was for the original, Victorian curiosity-seekers.
On the second floor, the Galerie d’ Architecture Moderne et Contemporaine represents the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The collection has a more thoughtful scheme, taking in not just the development of architecture itself but of its social role as well. Among the scores of photograph, designs and original architectural models you’ll find a fascinating reconstruction of an apartment from Le Corbusier’s infamous Cite Radieuse, in Marseille. The smaller Galerie des Peintures Murales et des Vitraux occupies the central pavilion on the second and third floors. In the same spirit as the moulages gallery, it displays life-size copies of French wall paintings and frescoes created by sixteen artists in the postwar period. A number of the ceiling paintings re-create the original architectural setting in three dimensions, and there are also four stunning copies of medieval stained –glass windows.
Excellent temporary exhibitions (€5) take place in separate galleries on the upper floors. The inaugural exhibitions included a retrospective of the work of Christian de Potzamparc, and a series of fascinating short films showing the development of new sites – from breaking the ground to the finished structure. A separate space, the Galeries d’ Actualite, houses exhibitions on the theme of innovative, utopian or futuristic schemes. Even if you’re not studying its collections, the library on the first floor is worth visiting for its ceiling mural, a life-size copy of a Romanesque painting from the nave vault of the church of St-Savin-sur-Gartempe.
