Attractions and distractions for kids

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 dated design, which hides readers underground and stores the books in four L-shaped glass towers.He also forgot to specify blinds to protect books from sunlight; they had to be added afterwards. In the central void is a garden (filled with 140 trees, which were transported from Fontainebleau at enormous expense). The library houses over ten million volumes and can accommodate 3,000 readers.The research section, just below the public reading rooms, opened in 1998. Much of the library is open to the public: books, newspapers and periodicals are accessible to anyone over 18, and you can browse through photographic, film and sound archives in the audio-visual section.

Once home to the giant slaughterhouses of Paris, Parc de la Villette has kept just a few remnants of its industrial past—a hall, some old buildings—but most notably, its immense size. Spanning 35 hectares, it’s the largest park in Paris. In 1987, Swiss architect Bernard Tschumi transformed this site on the city’s northeastern edge, crossed by the Canal de l’Ourcq, into a vast contemporary park. A Garden City for Everyone Designed as a sort of “garden city,” the park connects two major landmarks: the Cité des Sciences in the north and the Grande Halle and Cité de la Musique in the south. It’s one of the few parks in Paris open all night, and that’s no accident—it’s not fenced in or closed off. Instead, it’s imagined as a space you move through as much as stay in: a place to relax, play, stroll, explore art, or just hang out. A Hub for Events, Music, and Open-Air Fun Its massive lawns regularly host public events. While the beloved Villette Sonique music festival is no longer running, the park is still buzzing with life, especially during the Open-Air Film Festival, which screens movies around a different theme each summer. The vibe is always festive—legend has it that over 2,000 people once got up to dance under the stars during the final credits of Grease. Toward the end of summer, the Jazz à la Villette festival takes over, bringing rhythm and soul to the park. And with both the Cité des Sciences and Cité de la Musique on site, you could easily spend an entire day here....

Père-Lachaise is the celebrity cemetery - it has almost anyone French, talented and dead that you care to mention. Not even French, for that matter. Creed and nationality have never prevented entry: you just had to have lived or died in Paris or have an allotted space in a family tomb. Look at our Insiders’ Guide to Père-Lachaise for tips and ideas for enjoying a day at this iconic spot, and this handy walkers map of where to find the most famous. 

Paris's first planned square was commissioned in 1605 by Henri IV and inaugurated by his son Louis XIII in 1612. With harmonious red-brick and stone arcaded façades and steeply pitched slate roofs, it differs from the later pomp of the Bourbons. Laid out symmetrically with carriageways through Pavillon de la Reine on the north side and Pavillon du Roi on the south, the other lots were sold off as concessions to officials and nobles (some façades are imitation brick). It was called place Royale prior to the Napoleonic Wars, when the Vosges was the first region to pay its war taxes. Mme de Sévigné, salon hostess and letter-writer, was born at no.1bis in 1626. At that time the garden hosted duels and trysts; now it attracts children from the nearby nursery school.

Up the slopes of the Hauts de Belleville, there are views over the city from rue Piat and rue des Envierge, but as far as panoramas go, you’ll be hard pushed to find a better skyscape than the one rolling below the Parc de Belleville.  This modern but charming common, was created in 1988 to bring a stretch of greenery to the park-deprived 20th, and from its slopes you can see as far as the Eiffel Tower in the west. Needless to say, the best time to come is at sundown when an orangey hue descends over Paris’s iconic grey rooftops. For several hundred years, the area was covered in vines: a nod to which you’ll find in the top part of the park where 140 pieds of Pinot Meunier and Chardonnay vines still produce 2 to 3 kilos of grapes each year. In fact, as far as wine trivia goes, the Parc de Belleville (or at least the ground it’s sitting on) is also linked to the French word ‘piquette’, which means ‘bad wine’ - not because the piquette made here Between the 14th and 18th centuries was actually bad, but because the meaning was changed over the centuries. Piquette was originally a ‘young’ wine.  

Between the Louvre and place de la Concorde, the gravelled alleyways of these gardens have been a chic promenade ever since they opened to the public in the 16th century; and the popular mood persists with the funfair that sets up along the rue de Rivoli side in summer. André Le Nôtre created the prototypical French garden with terraces and central vista running down the Grand Axe through circular and hexagonal ponds. When the Tuileries palace was burned down during the Paris Commune in 1871, the park was expanded. As part of Mitterrand's Grand Louvre project, fragile sculptures such as Coysevox's winged horses were transferred to the Louvre and replaced by copies, and the Maillol sculptures were returned to the Jardins du Carrousel; a handful of modern sculptures has been added, including bronzes by Laurens, Moore, Ernst, Giacometti, and Dubuffet's Le Bel Costumé. Replanting has restored parts of Le Nôtre's design and replaced damaged trees, and there's a gardeners' bookshop by place de la Concorde.

There are plenty of handsomely ordered opportunities to indulge in a bit of park life in Paris, from the pathways of the Jardin des Tuileries to the ponds of the Jardin du Luxembourg. But if you're looking for something a little less formal, one patch of greenery definitely worth a stroll is the Parc des Buttes-Chaumont. Set high up in Belleville and often missed by weekenders keen not to stray too far from the tourist loop, this 19th arrondissement gem is one of the city's most magical spots.When the city's boundaries were expanded in 1860, Belleville - once a village that provided Paris with fruit, wine and weekend escapes - was absorbed and the Buttes-Chaumont was created on the site of a former gypsum and limestone quarry. The park, with its meandering paths, waterfalls, temples and vertical cliffs, was designed by Adolphe Alphand for Haussmann, and was opened as part of the celebrations for the Universal Exhibition in 1867.After lounging with the locals for a few hours, head for the park's hugely hip hangout, the wonderfully jolly Rosa Bonheur or Pavillon Puebla. Open till midnight, it makes the perfect place to sip an apéro and take in the stunning views of the city below.

The 25-hectare park is a prized family attraction. Kids come from across the city for its pony rides, ice-cream stands, puppet shows, pedal karts, sandpits, metal swingboats and merry-go-round. The playground has an entrance fee.

The Conciergerie looks every inch the forbidding medieval fortress. However, much of the façade was added in the 1850s, long after Marie-Antoinette, Danton and Robespierre had been imprisoned here. The 13th-century Bonbec tower, built during the reign of St Louis, the 14th-century twin towers, César and Argent, and the Tour de l'Horloge all survive from the Capetian palace.The visit takes you through the Salle des Gardes, the medieval kitchens with their four huge chimneys, and the Salle des Gens d'Armes, an impressive vaulted Gothic hall built between 1301 and 1315 for Philippe 'le Bel'. After the royals moved to the Louvre, the fortress became a prison under the watch of the Concierge.The wealthy had private cells with their own furniture, which they paid for; others crowded on beds of straw. A list of Revolutionary prisoners, including a hairdresser, shows that not all victims were nobles. In Marie-Antoinette's cell, the Chapelle des Girondins, are her crucifix, some portraits and a guillotine blade.

This is the official entrance to the 3,000km (1,864-mile) tunnel network that runs under much of the city. With public burial pits overflowing in the era of the Revolutionary Terror, the bones of six million people were transferred to the catacombes.The bones of Marat, Robespierre and their cronies are packed in with wall upon wall of their fellow citizens. A damp, cramped tunnel takes you through a series of galleries before you reach the ossuary, the entrance to which is announced by a sign engraved in the stone: 'Stop! This is the empire of death.'The tour lasts approximately 45 minutes and the temperature in the tunnels is 14°C.