Place Royale
The Place des Vosges, emblem of the historic Marais district, is one of the oldest squares in Paris and one of the city’s five royal squares (built for or by kings), along with the Place des Victoires, the Place Dauphine on Île de la Cité, the Place Vendôme, and the Place de la Concorde.
Commissioned by King Henri IV in the early 17th century and named the Place Royale, it has remarkably preserved its original layout.
This 140-m by 140-m enclosed square is bordered by four rows of two-story private mansions, surrounded by gardens and lawns.
Two taller pavilions stand out among the 36 identical townhouses: the Pavillon du Roi (King’s Pavilion), at the entrance on Rue de Birague, and the Pavillon de la Reine (Queen’s Pavilion), on Rue des Francs-Bourgeois.
The mansions’ white stone and red brick facades, their blue-grey slate roofs, cornices, and dormer windows, lend the square an elegant architectural harmony. The ground-floor arcades house art galleries, boutiques, and restaurants, many of which are open on Sundays, making the Place des Vosges one of the most elegant squares in Paris.
Place de l’Indivisibilité – Place des Vosges
Henry IV was assassinated in 1610 and thus did not live to see the square completed and inaugurated in 1612 to celebrate the betrothal of his son, Louis XIII, to Anne of Austria.
The square quickly became the centre of festivities for the royal court: cavalcades, tournaments, ring games, and sometimes even duels! It brought a certain prestige to the area and attracted aristocrats and important figures of the kingdom.
Then came the French Revolution in 1792… and the Place Royale was renamed Place de l’Indivisibilité (Indivisibility Square). It acquired its current name, Place des Vosges, in 1800, to pay homage to and reward the Vosges department, located in Eastern France, for sending the first volunteers and for being the first to pay taxes during the Revolution.
Decline and revival of the Place des Vosges
Let’s go back to the end of the 17th century, when Louis XIV and his court settled in Versailles. Courtiers and wealthy notables thus abandoned their elegant mansions on the Place des Vosges to settle in the Faubourg Saint-Germain and Faubourg Saint-Honoré, two districts that flourished along the road to Versailles.
The Place des Vosges lost its appeal. The grand townhouses were rented or sold to merchants, artisans, and traders, and divided into apartments, shops, and workshops according to their trades.
That said, Victor Hugo fell under the old-world charm of the Place des Vosges and lived at the Hôtel de Guéménée, No. 6, from 1832 to 1849. In 1902, the City of Paris acquired the mansion to commemorate the centenary of his birth and established the Musée Victor Hugo to showcase the writer’s important collection of drawings.
However, the Place des Vosges, as well as the Marais district, fell into oblivion until the early 1960s, when residents created a heritage protection committee under the leadership of André Malraux, Minister of Culture.
Concerned by the rampant urban development of the post-war period, André Malraux passed a law on August 4, 1962, to control urban planning regulations and thus protect and enhance France’s historical and aesthetic heritage. Protected sectors, “possessing a historical or aesthetic character, or of a nature justifying the preservation, restoration, and enhancement of all or part of a group of buildings,” were established.
The Marais district and the magnificent Place des Vosges were thus saved!
Directions: 4th District – Follow Rue Saint-Antoine -Turn right into Rue de Birague
Metro: Bastille on Lines 1, 5, 8
Coordinates: Lat 48.856182 – Long 2.365758
