Historic Marais Courtyards

The Hôtel de Soubise wears a double staircase of white stone tucked behind an ornate, curved gate on the rue des Francs-Bourgeois. Originally a private mansion for the Prince and Princess of Soubise, it now holds the deepest secrets of…

Rue des Rosiers curves through the heart of the Marais, marked by a dense cluster of kosher bakeries and falafel shops. During the Middle Ages, rose bushes lined this path, giving the street its name. In the nineteenth century, thousands…

The Rosiers Joseph Migneret Garden hides behind a high stone wall on Rue des Rosiers, marked by a simple wrought iron gate. It occupies the former site of private courtyards that long ago housed residents of the Marais. Joseph Migneret,…

The Jardin de l'Hotel de Lamoignon sits behind a high, weathered stone wall, accessible through a small gate on Rue des Francs-Bourgeois. This garden serves as the quiet courtyard for a seventeenth-century private mansion built for Diane…

The Carnavalet Museum occupies two adjacent stone mansions, the Hotel Carnavalet and the Hotel Le Peletier de Saint Fargeau, marked by a seventeenth-century triumphal arch on the street. This institution holds the history of Paris, from…

The Place des Vosges wears a uniform skin of red brick and steep blue slate roofs. King Henry the Fourth ordered this square built in sixteen oh five on the site of a former royal horse market. He wanted a space for aristocrats to live in…

The Hôtel de Sully features a facade covered in ornate stone carvings of the four seasons and the four elements. Maximilien de Béthune, the Duke of Sully and a top minister to King Henry the Fourth, bought this mansion in sixteen…