Place du Palais Royal

The Place du Palais Royal sits directly across from the Louvre and serves as the gateway to a site that began as the private residence of Cardinal Richelieu in the seventeenth century. When Richelieu commissioned the building in sixteen twenty eight, he intended it to be his personal home, but he eventually bequeathed the property to King Louis the Thirteenth. It was later transformed into a royal palace and served as the childhood residence of the Sun King, Louis the Fourteenth. The square itself has acted as the threshold for centuries of French political upheaval, standing as a silent witness to the transitions of power that shaped the nation.