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6th Arrondissement Guide
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Streets
Rue Bonaparte and Rue Visconti
L'Ecole des Beaux-Arts on Rue Bonaparte is France's most acclaimed art school. It was founded in 1811 by Napoleon who lived on the street when young. On rue Visconti once lived Racine, and Balzac had his print shop at #17. Parallel to rue Visconti at #5 rue des Beaux-Arts, Edouard Manet was born in 1835. At #13 rue des Beaux-Arts is "L'Hotel", the garret hotel of Oscar Wilde fame and where he died, now luxuriously refurbished with 'themed rooms'. It is worth a visit if you are in the area.
Rue Jacob
On rue Jacob is the house and studio, now museum, where Delacroix lived and where he was frequently visited by George Sand and Frederic Chopin. Richard Wagner also lived on Rue Jacob, as did Thomas Jefferson when in Paris. At #7 Racine lived when young; Richard Wagner resided at #14 from 1841 to 1842; Ingres once lived at # 27 and Hemingway occupied a tiny upstairs room at #44. Natalie Barney's former residence is landmarked but not open to the public. In the garden you can see a small Doric temple bearing the inscription A l'Amitie, "to friendship." Off Rue Jacob is one of the most charming squares in Paris, Place de Furstenberg.
Rue de Buci
Rue de Buci is a pretty little marketplace surrounded by cafes and restaurants and leads into rue de Seine which is filled with galleries all the way to the river. On rue Mazarine was the theatre where Moliere made his first appearance as an actor and opened a theatre, the Comedie-Francaise. The oldest cafe in Paris, founded in 1686, Cafe Procope is in the same street.
Odeon
The area around Odeon is famous for its art cinemas and restaurants and is a favorite meeting ground for students attending the Sorbonne, giving it a vibrant atmosphere.
Cour du Commerce-St-Andre
A partially covered quaint passage, it was built in 1776. The workshop where the first guillotine was built stood in this passage. It became a hotbed of revolutionary activity where Marat printed his revolutionary pamphlets. Danton and Desmoulin lived at #20, which was demolished during the building of blvd. St Germain by Haussmann in the mid-19th century. Danton's home has been commemorated by a statue of him at the Carrefour de 1'Odeon next to the Metro. On the nearby Rue de l'Ecole de Medecine Marat was stabbed in his bath by Charlotte Corday.
Rue de l'Odeon
Was the original home of Sylvia Beach's bookstore, Shakespeare and Company She is particularly associated with Hemingway and the publication of James Joyce's 'Ulysses', but she encouraged and helped Ezra Pound, Archibald MacLeish, Thornton Wilder and F. Scott Fitzgerald. At the top of the hill is the Theatre de l'Odeon, designed in 1782 to hold nearly 2,000 people, the largest in Paris at the time.
Rue Monsieur-le-Prince
Every French king's brother was traditionally called Monsieur-le-Prince. This street was popular with resident Americans as James McNeill Whistler, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, and Oliver Wendell Holmes.
Gardens
Jardin du Luxembourg is the most loved park in Paris. It is large and has fountains, flowers, statues, tennis courts, concerts in the summer and on Sunday, Tai Chi. Within the park is located the Palais du Luxembourg, home to the French Senate. Next to the senate is the Musee du Luxembourg, which often has art exhibitions. Nearby on rue de Fleurus lived Gertrude Stein and her companion Alice B. Tokas who opened their home to many famous expatriates, writers and artists, including Hemingway and Picasso.
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Local Connection©
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Paris 6th Arrondissement - St Germain des Pres • St Sulpice • Jardins des Luxembourg
The 6th arrondissement is chic. It has always been regarded as an intellectual center with many writers, artists and creative people living here. It is the home of Paris publishing and antiquarian book and print dealers. Over the past few years many luxury fashion brands have located stores in the area. St-Germain was a center of bohemianism and existentialism in the glittering cafe society of the post-war years. Names associated with this period are Sartre and Camus and the singer Juliette Greco. Young French teenagers spent nights in its jazz clubs and cabarets. Many famous French singers sang in the clubs or lived in the area, such as Georges Brassens, Jacques Brel, Charles Trenet, Guy Beart, Charles Aznavour. The home where Serge Gainsbourgh lived on rue de Verneuil has become a graffitied shrine. Jazz greats who played here include Sidney Bechet, Miles Davis and Duke Ellington.
What to See
Sites, Covered Passages, Museums and more
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Places of Interest
The Church of St.Germain-des-Pres
The oldest Abbey in Paris dating from 543 AD, and the heart of the sixth. This church has always been an important religious center, and over the years acquired immense property. The church got its name from the peasants who would come here on pilgrimage in the 8th century. Saint-Germain-des-Pres meaning Saint Germain of the Fields. Around the year 1000 a new church in the Romanesque style was built with three bell towers, two were destroyed but the third, the gate-tower, is still in place.
On the corner of the square in front of the church is the cafe ‘Les Deux Magots’ and nearby is the ‘Cafe Flore’, both of which are literary and artistic shrines associated with many writers and artists such as Jean Paul Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir, Picasso and Apollinaire. Across the road is Brasserie Lipp favored by politicians, writers and celebrities.
The streets south of Blvd. St-Germain to the Seine are picturesque and have a real feel of 18th and 19th century Paris.
St. Sulpice
Work on the church of St-Suplice, at one time Paris's largest, began in 1646, but is still ongoing. It has one of the world's largest organs, comprising 6,700 pipes. The Chapelle des Anges (Chapel of the Angel) has two frescoes by Delacroix which were painted in Delacroix’s final years and were a high point in his career. Outside the Church is a large square with the 1844 fountain by Visconti at its center. It is the location of the annual Foire de Saint-German held at the beginning of June and which lasts for a month. This fair has been an annual tradition for centuries.
Moorish Paris
• Musee de la Monnaie - Coins and historical documents
• Musee Delacroix - Home and studio of Delacroix
• Musee d' Histoire de la Medecine - Medical History
• Musee de la Mineralogie - Mineral museum
• Musee du Luxembourg - Art exhibitions
• Musee Zadkine - Home and studio of the Russian sculptor
• Musee Hebert - Works of painter Ernest Hebert 1817-1908
• Museum of Italian landscapes
Mansions
Pont des Arts
Built in 1803, the first iron bridge in Paris. It was built for pedestrian use and has benches along its length. The bridge stretches from the Institut de France to the Louvre, and has one of the loveliest views in Paris.
Quai Voltaire
Along the Seine from rue Bonarparte to rue du Bac is a pleasant place for strolling with its lovely view of the Louvre andthe high-class antique stores in the surrounding streets, called the ‘Carre de Rive Gauche’. In mid-June there is a festival and street party when all the shops have an “Open House”. The quai here is named in honor of Voltaire who died in a house on this spot in 1778. There is a café on the actual site and it is a great place for a short break from sight-seeing
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What to Do
City Tours, Cooking, Wine Promenades, Photo Adventures, Private Guides & More
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Evening Activities
Dinner Cruises on the Don Juan Yacht
Every evening Yachts de Paris invites you to enjoy a gourmet dinner by the celebrated chef 2 Stars Michelin Chef Jean-Pierre Vigato on an unforgettable cruise aboard one of their magnificent yachts.
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Paradis Latin Cabaret
Paradis Latin welcomes you to the oldest Parisian cabaret and totally renovated, for an evening in its theatre built by Gustave Eiffel to watch the latest show "Paradis d’Amour"
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Adventures thru the Lens
From humble church to towering cathedral, Notre-Dame is the world-famous jewel in the crown of the Ile de la Cite, the original Paris before the city outgrew its island boundaries. But this whole area is steeped in history and secrets just waiting to be discovered.
We will enter the moving and visually stunning monument to the deportation. We will roam the banks of the river and the twisting backstreets rich in atmosphere and echoes of the past. And we will investigate the legendary Latin Quarter, ending our tour in a typical French bistro for a glass of wine and a friendly photo critique of our efforts (for those of us who took our photos digitally, of course).
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Private Walking Tours
A Medieval Sampler
Including the famous St. Germain des Pres Abbey (built, destroyed and rebuilt from the 6th to 19th centuries), the 13th century Cordeliers monastery refectory, and the 15th century Cluny abbots' "townhouse" - now a marvelous museum on the Middle Ages, Place Maubert where a 16th century printer was burnt alive for heresy for having re-translated one of Plato's Dialogues, and the Bernardins Monastery refectory dating from the 13th century.
Learning in Paris
University and student life (not always very calm!) from the 12th through the 16th centuries, via different "colleges" frequented by students as different as St. Ignatius of Loyola (founder of the Jesuits) and Protestant reformer Jean Calvin.
Around rue de la Huchette: Heart of the Latin Quarter
Beginning on "Here Lies The Heart Street" (its original Medieval name was far less romantic!), this walk takes in architectural reminiscences of Renaissance King Francois Ier, 19th century poet Charles Baudelaire, a 16th century Royal Prosecutor who O-D'd here on opium, and Napoleon Bonaparte. Then: a series of antique punning shop signs, the oldest tree in Paris, the intimate 12th-13th century St. Julien le Pauvre church and other medieval memories.
The Mouffetard Quaint Quarter
A highway leaving Paris for Rome 2,000 years ago, Rue Mouffetard still boasts a street market that has functioned since about 1350, not to forget a public fountain erected by Marie de Medici, and church that briefly hosted a convulsionist sect ("barkers," "meowers," "jumpers," etc.) in the 1700s. This tour also takes in the house where Ernest Hemingway lived in the 1930s and segments of the Medieval city rampart.
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Left Bank Wine Promenade
The aim of this wine tour is to immerse you in the authentic wine and bar culture of Paris. We have chosen to concentrate on the 5th arrondissement on the Left Bank because of its historic associations and interesting and picturesque ambience.
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Where to Eat
The Procope : 13 rue de l'Ancienne Comedie
The Procope, the oldest restaurant in Paris and the first café, opened in 1686. In 1689, the Comédie-Française moved to opposite the Procope and, between shows, the café became THE café for theatre-goers and actors. Voltaire, Rousseau and Diderot were loyal regulars. During the revolution, Danton, Marat could all be found here.
