National Institute for Blind Youth

The Institut National des Jeunes Aveugles in the seventh arrondissement features a tall, imposing iron fence topped with distinctive golden spikes that separate the courtyard from the boulevard. Founded by Valentin Haüy in seventeen eighty-four, it serves as the world's first school for blind students. Louis Braille became a student here at age ten. He spent years experimenting with punctured paper in the basement, eventually developing his tactile reading system while living in these very dormitories.