Old Charity Center

The Vieille Charité is defined by its rounded, three-story arcades of pink-and-white limestone, centered around an oval chapel with a prominent dome. It began in sixteen forty as a refuge for the beggars and homeless of Marseille, ordered by the city council to keep them off the streets. When the plague hit in seventeen twenty, its mission shifted to housing abandoned children. Pierre Puget designed the chapel, and his work there remains the signature feature of the entire site.