Built on the site of the chapel of the hermit Séverin, itself set on a much earlier Merovingian burial ground, this lovely Flamboyant Gothic edifice was long the parish church...

One of the city's most child-friendly attractions, this is guaranteed to bowl adults over too. Located within the Jardin des Plantes, this beauty of a 19th-century iron-framed,...

Although small and slightly dishevelled, the Paris botanical garden - which contains more than 10,000 species and includes tropical greenhouses and rose, winter and Alpine...

Soufflot's neo-classical megastructure was the architectural grand projet of its day, commissioned by a grateful Louis XV to thank Sainte Geneviève for his recovery from...

This Roman arena, where wild beasts and gladiators fought, could seat 10,000 people. It was still visible during the reign of Philippe-Auguste in the 12th century, then...

Opened in 1996, the new national library was the last and costliest of Mitterrand's grands projets. Its architect, Dominique Perrault, was criticised for his curiously dated...

This austerely beautiful chapel, designed by Libéral Bruand and completed in 1677, features an octagonal dome in the centre and eight naves in which the sick were separated...

Along the Seine, the striking bright green Cité de la Mode et du Design, designed by Jakob + MacFarlane, is due to open in early 2009, containing restaurants and cafés, a...

Founded in 1530 with the patronage of François I, the college is a place of learning and a research institute. The present building dates from the 16th and 17th centuries;...

Anne of Austria, the wife of Louis XIII, vowed to erect 'a magnificent temple' if God blessed her with a son. She got two. The resulting church and surrounding Benedictine...

A former sanctuary for pilgrims en route to Compostela, this much-mauled church dates from the late 12th century, on the cusp of Romanesque and Gothic, and has capitals richly...

The original chapel here was a dependency of the Abbaye Ste-Geneviève. The rebuilding towards the end of the 15th century created a somewhat larger, late Gothic structure best...

Some distance removed from the Arabic-speaking inner-city enclaves of Barbès and Belleville, this vast Hispano-Moorish construct is nevertheless the spiritual heart of France's...

Founded in 1253, the University of the Sorbonne was at the centre of the Latin Quarter's intellectual activity from the Middle Ages until 1968, when it was occupied by students...