City of Light’s Architectural Origins

For a painter, the mecca of the world, for study, for inspiration and for living is here on this star called Paris. Just look at it, no wonder so many artists have come here and called it home. Brother, if you can't paint in Paris, you'd better give up and marry the boss's daughter. Jerry (Gene Kelly), An American In Paris

What’s to love about Paris? A first time tourist will tell you about the monuments and museums, the cafes and restaurants, the sparkles on the Eiffel Tower at night. The occasional visitor will tell you about their favorite neighborhood with its tiny streets, one-of-a-kind shops and ornate building facades. But as you spend more and more time in Paris, your perspective changes and your appreciation grows to love Paris from the inside: the hidden courtyards leading to apartments with their grand features, their quirky past, hidden terraces, porthole windows or marble fireplaces.

Is your true love a grand apartment with its high ceilings, ornate plaster moldings and floor to ceiling French doors? Or cathedral beamed ceilings and tile floors? A former sewing factory turned modern loft apartment?

Some Paris lovers take that appreciation one step further and decide to buy a property of their own. They target a neighborhood and a style of property, and embark on the real estate journey. But many buyers hit a roadblock at that point: why can’t I have a Haussmann-style apartment on the Ile Saint Louis? Where is that great loft property, I am looking for in Saint Germain des Pres? What do you mean less than 1% of the buildings in the Marais have an elevator? Many buyers are surprised to find that they can’t always have the apartment they want where they want it in Paris. The reason lies in the history and development of this centuries old city.

The small tribe that originally lived on the island of Ile de la Cite was discovered around 2000 years ago by the Romans in their push to expand their empire northward. The Romans settled in the 5th arrondissement and on the Ile de la Cite; but ruins from this time can be found all over Paris. The area was densely settled around the river, and land parcels were small to accommodate a quickly growing population. These original divisions of land parcels had a profound impact on the size of buildings in these neighborhoods.

During medieval times and up to the end of the 16th century, the city spread haphazardly with the castles or royal squares in the center, surrounded by the stately houses of the upper classes, which were in turn surrounded by working class suburbs and then the outlying rural villages of the time: Montmartre, Auteuil, Passy, Bagnolet, neighborhoods in northern and western Paris.

With the rise of a true aristocratic class during the late Renaissance period (16th and 17th centuries) emerged the era of the Hôtel Particulier: magnificent private urban chateaux with grand courtyards hidden from view behind large arched carriage doors. Louis Le Barbier, Paris’ first real estate developer, established elegant neighborhoods in today’s Latin Quarter, Saint-Germain des Pres and Rue Saint-Honoré by constructing hôtels which he then sold to nobles. Many more of these were built near Place des Vosges on the Marais and on Ile St. Louis.

The neighborhoods surrounding these aristocratic dwellings had to accommodate an ever-growing population in the same amount of space, so new, taller buildings were constructed, but still limited to the base size of the ones they replaced. These buildings were divided into two-room apartments for rent. In recent times, larger apartments have been created by combining the original smaller ones. In these surviving areas today, you will still find cozy apartments, often with exposed beams and stone walls.

By the mid 19th century, the city’s population had soared to over a million. With no system in place to deal with waste and garbage, squalid conditions brought rampant disease. Traffic was disastrous, and there were no public parks. Emperor Napoleon III, inspired by his years in exile in London was determined to overhaul the city. He commissioned Baron Haussmann to deal with the challenge of creating a sewage system, larger boulevards to handle the growing traffic, and larger, modern stone buildings (now known as “Haussmannian” style) in place of the crumbling facades, unsanitary housing and winding streets.

The new “Haussmannian” style buildings housed apartments for the middle and upper middle classes offered larger living spaces than those built earlier for the working class, and were situated primarily along the grand boulevards to benefit from spectacular views of the Paris monuments. The high ceilings, beautiful herringbone wood floors, ornate moldings and floor-to-ceiling French doors of this era make these among the most desirable style apartments for those seeking to buy in Paris.

The Marais is one of the few areas of central Paris that escaped the Haussmannian bulldozer: a Jewish ghetto at the time, it remains distinct for its cobblestone streets and narrow centuries-old buildings and historic private mansions.

Paris architectural styles continued to evolve with the Art Nouveau and Art Deco styles of the early 19th century, most prominently seen today in Hector Guimard’s trademark Metro entrances. Fortunately, in the last 30 years, old factories in garment districts and immigrant neighborhoods were renovated into open space loft style apartments maintaining their original charm and high glass ceilings rather than being torn down and replaced with the new modern buildings.

Each area of Paris offers its own unique, fascinating features, both on the streets and behind the heavy wooden doors of its buildings. But be warned, if you fall in love with a charming, medieval neighborhood in Paris, the grand, elegant apartment buildings of the 19th century are going to be scarce! To understand this history and these constraints is to truly appreciate the distinctiveness of each arrondissement of this captivating city.

Miranda Bothe is the founder of Paris Property Group, a full service real estate broker specializing in international clients buying or selling property in Paris.