There’s no doubt that Paris has a world-beating array of galleries and museums, but make your way to any of these on a weekend and you can expect lengthy queues. But even if you’re busy during the week, there’s an easy way around this: many museums and galleries operate late-night openings at least once a week, meaning you can enjoy a post-work cultural visit in relative peace and quiet any day of the week.
We’ve rounded up the best late-night openings, day by day, to help you decide where to head next time you want to swap late-night chat shows for something a bit more cultural.
RECOMMENDED: The best art galleries in Paris
Open until 8.30pm
Long terrace steps and a pair of stone lions usher visitors into this grand 19th-century mansion, home to a collection of objets d'art and fine paintings. The collection was assembled by Edouard André and his artist wife Nélie Jacquemart and the mansion was built to house their impressive art hoard, which includes Rembrandts...
Open until 10pm
The primary colours, exposed pipes and air ducts designed by Italo-British architectural duo Renzo Piano and Richard Rogers make the Centre Pompidou or 'Beaubourg' one of the best-known sights in Paris. The exhibition space holds the largest collection of modern art in Europe...
Open until midnight
When it opened in 2002, many thought the Palais' stripped-back interior was a design statement. In fact, it was a response to tight finances. The 1937 building has now come into its own as an open-plan space with a skylit central hall, hosting exhibitions and performances. The roll-call of artists is impressive (Pierre Joseph, Wang Du and others)...
Open until 9pm
The Centre National de la Photographie moved into this site in 2005. The building, which once served as a tennis court, has been divided into two white, almost hangar-like galleries. It is not an intimate space, but it works well for showcase retrospectives...
Open until 10pm
Jean Nouvel's glass and steel building, an exhibition centre with Cartier's offices above, is as much a work of art as the installations inside. Shows by artists and photographers often have wide-ranging themes, such as 'Birds' or 'Desert'. Live events around the shows are called Nuits Nomades...
Open until 8.30pm
Opened in 2003, this two-floor gallery is dedicated to the work of acclaimed photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson. It consists of a tall, narrow atelier in a 1913 building, with a minutely catalogued archive, open to researchers, and a lounge on the fourth floor screening films...
Open until 9.45pm
The world's largest museum is also its most visited, with an incredible 8.8 million visitors in 2011. It is a city within the city, a vast, multi-level maze of galleries, passageways, staircases and escalators. It's famous for the artistic glories it contains within, but the very fabric of the museum is a masterpiece in itself...
Open until 10pm
The primary colours, exposed pipes and air ducts designed by Italo-British architectural duo Renzo Piano and Richard Rogers make the Centre Pompidou or 'Beaubourg' one of the best-known sights in Paris. The exhibition space holds the largest collection of modern art in Europe...
Open until midnight
When it opened in 2002, many thought the Palais' stripped-back interior was a design statement. In fact, it was a response to tight finances. The 1937 building has now come into its own as an open-plan space with a skylit central hall, hosting exhibitions and performances. The roll-call of artists is impressive (Pierre Joseph, Wang Du and others)...
Open until 9pm
Surrounded by trees on the banks of the Seine, this museum, housed in an extraordinary building by Jean Nouvel, is a vast showcase for non-European cultures, dedicated to the ethnic art of Africa, Oceania, Asia and the Americas...
Open until 9pm
This is one of the world's major collections of design and the decorative arts and is located in the west wing of the Louvre since its opening a century ago. The major focus here is French furniture and tableware. From extravagant carpets to delicate crystal and porcelain, there is much to admire...
Open until 9pm
Originally a museum of the Empire period left to the state by collector Paul Marmottan, this old hunting pavilion has become a famed holder of Impressionist art. Its Monet collection, the largest in the world, numbers 165 works, plus sketchbooks, palette and photos. A special circular room was created for the breathtaking late water lily canvases...
Open until 9pm
Founded by collector Antoine de Galberg, and set in a former printworks, the Red House is an independently run space that alternates monographic shows of contemporary artists' work with pieces from different private art collections...
Open until 9pm
Opened in 2007, this architecture and heritage museum impresses principally by its scale. The expansive ground floor is filled with life-size mock-ups of cathedral façades and heritage buildings, and interactive screens place the models in context...
Open until 9pm
Created as a cultural centre for kids by Sylvie Girardet, Anne Tardy and Claire Merleau-Ponty in the 1970s, the Musée en Herbe looks at the humorous side of art, making it accessible for all ages. As an added bonus, the museum also offers lots of workshops for chidlren to get creative themselves...
Lovers of cartoons, rejoice: the new-ish Art Ludique museum is a shiny tribute to everything hand-drawn (and more). Situated in the heart of the Docks en Seine complex, it puts on a range of exhibitions on everything from graphic novels to video games and Japanese anime. An insightful trip behind the scenes of this richest of subjects.
Open until 9pm
This look at clothes through history takes an academic approach to its subject. Housed in a hôtel particulier built by Eiffel, the Galliera has a huge costume collection. It has links with the fashion industry, and its initiative with young designers shows innovative work...
Open until 9.30pm
The 'arts and trades' museum is, in fact, Europe's oldest science museum, founded in 1794 by the constitutional bishop Henri Grégoire, initially as a way to educate France's manufacturing industry in useful scientific techniques. It's a fascinating, attractively laid out and vast collection of treasures...
Open until 9.45pm
The Musée d'Orsay, originally a train station designed by Victor Laloux in 1900, houses a huge collection spanning the period between 1848 and 1914, and is home to a profusion of works by Delacroix, Corot, Manet, Renoir, Pissarro, Gauguin, Monet, Caillebotte, Cézanne, Van Gogh, Toulouse-Lautrec and others...
Open until 9pm
Surrounded by trees on the banks of the Seine, this museum, housed in an extraordinary building by Jean Nouvel, is a vast showcase for non-European cultures, dedicated to the ethnic art of Africa, Oceania, Asia and the Americas...
Open until 9.45pm
The world's largest museum is also its most visited, with an incredible 8.8 million visitors in 2011. It is a city within the city, a vast, multi-level maze of galleries, passageways, staircases and escalators. It's famous for the artistic glories it contains within, but the very fabric of the museum is a masterpiece in itself...
Open until 10pm
The primary colours, exposed pipes and air ducts designed by Italo-British architectural duo Renzo Piano and Richard Rogers make the Centre Pompidou or 'Beaubourg' one of the best-known sights in Paris. The exhibition space holds the largest collection of modern art in Europe...
Open until 10pm
Lovers of cartoons, rejoice: the new-ish Art Ludique museum is a shiny tribute to everything hand-drawn (and more). Situated in the heart of the Docks en Seine complex, it puts on a range of exhibitions on everything from graphic novels to video games and Japanese anime...
Open until 9pm
Designed by architect Frank Gehry, this impressive new space plays host to Louis Vuitton Group CEO Bernard Arnault’s art collection. Visually stunning, the FLV is shell-shaped and made up of twelve glass sails that soar above the park's greenery. Inside is a huge auditorium divided into eleven galleries...
Open until midnight
When it opened in 2002, many thought the Palais' stripped-back interior was a design statement. In fact, it was a response to tight finances. The 1937 building has now come into its own as an open-plan space with a skylit central hall, hosting exhibitions and performances. The roll-call of artists is impressive (Pierre Joseph, Wang Du and others)...
Open until 9pm
Surrounded by trees on the banks of the Seine, this museum, housed in an extraordinary building by Jean Nouvel, is a vast showcase for non-European cultures, dedicated to the ethnic art of Africa, Oceania, Asia and the Americas...
Open until 10pm
The primary colours, exposed pipes and air ducts designed by Italo-British architectural duo Renzo Piano and Richard Rogers make the Centre Pompidou or 'Beaubourg' one of the best-known sights in Paris. The exhibition space holds the largest collection of modern art in Europe...
Open until midnight
When it opened in 2002, many thought the Palais' stripped-back interior was a design statement. In fact, it was a response to tight finances. The 1937 building has now come into its own as an open-plan space with a skylit central hall, hosting exhibitions and performances. The roll-call of artists is impressive (Pierre Joseph, Wang Du and others)...
Open until 10pm
The primary colours, exposed pipes and air ducts designed by Italo-British architectural duo Renzo Piano and Richard Rogers make the Centre Pompidou or 'Beaubourg' one of the best-known sights in Paris. The exhibition space holds the largest collection of modern art in Europe...
Open until midnight
When it opened in 2002, many thought the Palais' stripped-back interior was a design statement. In fact, it was a response to tight finances. The 1937 building has now come into its own as an open-plan space with a skylit central hall, hosting exhibitions and performances. The roll-call of artists is impressive (Pierre Joseph, Wang Du and others)...
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