The prince's and princess's rooms
Gilded ornament and ceiling paintings among the best surviving in France.
Guilhem Vellut from Paris, France — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Poulpy — CC BY-SA 3.0 · Public domain · Chatsam — CC BY-SA 3.0
No. The original documents are light-sensitive and cannot be shown permanently, so the museum rotates them through themed exhibitions. Do not go for a particular document without checking the official site. The decorated apartments are permanent and are the stronger reason to visit.
The Marais itself: the Musée Carnavalet, the Musée Picasso and Place des Vosges are all a short walk away, and all are private mansions of the same period turned into museums. Seeing two or three shows how the Paris elite lived before the Revolution.
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An eighteenth-century private mansion in the heart of the Marais, today housing the museum of the French National Archives and among the purest examples of Parisian Rococo. The interior apartments are the heart of the visit: the prince's and princess's rooms with their gilded ornament, ceiling paintings and pale colours, among the finest surviving French interior decoration of the period. Many Paris mansions lost their interiors or were converted; this one kept them. The archives themselves show documents from French history: royal decrees, papers of the Revolution, and letters and contracts spanning centuries. The displays rotate for conservation reasons — paper is not left in the light for long. The garden behind the mansion is open to the public and free, one of the few quiet spaces in the Marais. Practical points: a ticket covers the apartments and exhibitions, and the garden is free. It sometimes closes two days a week — check before going.
Gilded ornament and ceiling paintings among the best surviving in France.
Decrees, letters and contracts from centuries of French history, in rotation.
One of the few calm spaces in the crowded Marais.
Marais, 3rd arrondissement, Paris
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