The stories Paris keeps
Paris Echoes is a free audio companion for wandering Paris with earphones. Walk the streets and each story plays by itself when you reach the spot — or take a virtual stroll from anywhere in the world. Every story is original and names its source.
Start wandering or take a virtual strollLe Marais · 30 stories
House of Nicolas Flamel
Medieval · 51 rue de Montmorency
Built 1407
Hôtel de Soubise — National Archives
Architecture · 60 rue des Francs-Bourgeois
Courtyard free to enter during opening hours
Hôtel Salé — Musée Picasso
Hidden gem · 5 rue de Thorigny
Built 1656–1659
Musée Carnavalet & Madame de Sévigné
Literary · 23 rue de Sévigné
Sévigné lived here 1677–1696
Rue des Rosiers — the Pletzl
Memory · Rue des Rosiers
'Pletzl' means 'little square' in Yiddish
Place des Vosges & Victor Hugo
Literary · Place des Vosges
Inaugurated 1612
The July Column, Bastille
Revolution · Place de la Bastille
Fortress demolished from 1789
Saint-Paul-Saint-Louis
Architecture · 99 rue Saint-Antoine
Built 1627–1641
Village Saint-Paul courtyards
Hidden gem · Between rue Saint-Paul & rue des Jardins-Saint-Paul
Several entrances from surrounding streets
Wall of Philippe Auguste
Medieval · Rue des Jardins-Saint-Paul
Built c. 1190–1220
Hôtel de Sens & its cannonball
Revolution · 1 rue du Figuier
Built c. 1475–1519
Hôtel de Beauvais — young Mozart
Music · 68 rue François-Miron
Mozart stayed here as a child, 1763–1764
Mémorial de la Shoah
Memory · 17 rue Geoffroy-l'Asnier
Opened 2005
The secret door of Hôtel de Sully
Hidden gem · 62 rue Saint-Antoine
Built 1620s, later owned by the Duc de Sully
Victor Hugo's apartment
Literary · 6 place des Vosges
Hugo lived here 1832–1848
Jim Morrison's last address
Music · 17–19 rue Beautreillis
Morrison died here 3 July 1971
The oldest covered market in Paris
Hidden gem · 39 rue de Bretagne
Founded 1615
The city's own pawnshop
Hidden gem · 55 rue des Francs-Bourgeois
Municipal pawnshop, roots in the 1700s
A Gothic gate with nothing behind it
Medieval · 58 rue des Archives
Gatehouse built 1371
Two houses from the Middle Ages
Medieval · 11–13 rue François-Miron
15th-century half-timbered houses
The street that went mad for money
Hidden gem · Rue Quincampoix
John Law's Mississippi bubble, 1719–1720
A fountain older than the Renaissance
Medieval · Rue Saint-Martin, corner of rue de Venise
Fountain documented from 1392
Sixteen machines that splash
Hidden gem · Place Igor-Stravinsky
Created 1983
The elm of lost causes
Hidden gem · Place Saint-Gervais
Medieval elm used as a meeting point for debtors
The murder that started a civil war
Medieval · Impasse des Arbalétriers
Louis d'Orléans assassinated 23 November 1407
Where Figaro was written
Literary · 47 rue Vieille-du-Temple
Beaumarchais lived and wrote here
The tower that held a king
Revolution · Square du Temple
Royal family imprisoned here from August 1792
A village square inside the city
Hidden gem · Place du Marché-Sainte-Catherine
Former priory site, later a market
Scars of the Liberation
Memory · Parvis de l'Hôtel de Ville
Liberation fighting, August 1944
The boot scrapers at your feet
Hidden gem · Doorways along rue des Francs-Bourgeois
Boot scrapers survive on many Marais doorways
Saint-Germain · 11 stories
Place de Furstenberg & Delacroix
Hidden gem · 6 rue de Furstenberg
Delacroix lived here 1857–1863
Saint-Germain-des-Prés
Medieval · 3 place Saint-Germain-des-Prés
Bell tower c. 1000
Café de Flore
Literary · 172 boulevard Saint-Germain
Sartre & de Beauvoir wrote here in the 1940s
Le Procope
Literary · 13 rue de l'Ancienne-Comédie
Founded 1686
Cour du Commerce-Saint-André
Revolution · Cour du Commerce-Saint-André
Marat's press at No. 8
Oscar Wilde's final room
Literary · 13 rue des Beaux-Arts
Wilde died here 30 Nov 1900
Rue Visconti
Literary · Rue Visconti
Racine died here, 1699
Monnaie de Paris
Architecture · 11 quai de Conti
Building completed 1775
Cour de Rohan
Hidden gem · Cour de Rohan
Pas-de-mule mounting block
Saint-Sulpice & the brass line
Hidden gem · 2 rue Palatine
Gnomon installed 1743–44
12 rue de l'Odéon
Literary · 12 rue de l'Odéon
Shop here 1921–1941
Latin Quarter · 12 stories
Shakespeare and Company
Literary · 37 rue de la Bûcherie
Opened 1951 by George Whitman
Rue du Chat-qui-Pêche
Hidden gem · Rue du Chat-qui-Pêche
About 1.8 m wide
Cluny — Roman baths
Medieval · 28 rue Du Sommerard
Roman baths c. 200 AD
Saint-Étienne-du-Mont
Architecture · Place Sainte-Geneviève
Only surviving jubé in Paris
Arènes de Lutèce
Hidden gem · 49 rue Monge
1st century AD
The oldest tree in Paris
Hidden gem · Square René-Viviani
Robinia pseudoacacia, planted c. 1601
Le Caveau de la Huchette
Music · 5 rue de la Huchette
Jazz club since 1946
The twisted pillar of Saint-Séverin
Architecture · 3 rue des Prêtres-Saint-Séverin
Spiral pillar, c. 1490s
The Sorbonne
Medieval · Place de la Sorbonne
Founded 1257
The Panthéon & the pendulum
Architecture · Place du Panthéon
Foucault's demonstration, 1851
Collège des Bernardins
Medieval · 20 rue de Poissy
Founded 1240s
Where Ulysses was finished
Literary · 71 rue du Cardinal-Lemoine
Joyce here 1921
Mouffetard · 9 stories
Hemingway's first Paris home
Literary · 74 rue du Cardinal-Lemoine (Latin Quarter)
Lived here 1922–1923
39 rue Descartes
Literary · 39 rue Descartes
Verlaine died here, 1896
Place de la Contrescarpe
Literary · Place de la Contrescarpe
Opening scene of A Moveable Feast
Rue Mouffetard
Hidden gem · Rue Mouffetard
Follows an ancient Roman road
Saint-Médard
Revolution · 141 rue Mouffetard
Convulsionnaires, 1727–1732
The old Polytechnique gate
Architecture · 5 rue Descartes
Polytechnique here 1805–1976
George Orwell, down and out
Literary · 6 rue du Pot-de-Fer
Orwell here 1928–29
Fontaine du Pot-de-Fer
Hidden gem · 60 rue Mouffetard
Built 1671
The painted butcher's facade
Hidden gem · 134 rue Mouffetard
Sgraffito, 1929
Montmartre · 24 stories
A wall that says I love you
Hidden gem · Square Jehan-Rictus · Place des Abbesses
Inaugurated in 2000
Behind the Bateau-Lavoir doorway
Architecture · 13 place Émile-Goudeau
Artists’ residence associated with Picasso
A windmill above rue Lepic
Hidden gem · 75–77 rue Lepic
Associated with Renoir’s Dance at the Moulin de la Galette
A little square for Dalida
Music · Place Dalida · Rue de l’Abreuvoir
Square named for singer Dalida
The artists’ cabaret on the hill
Music · 22 rue des Saules
One of Paris’s oldest cabarets
Yes, those are Parisian grapevines
Hidden gem · Clos Montmartre · Rue des Saules / Rue Saint-Vincent
Clos Montmartre vineyard on rue des Saules
Renoir’s garden address
Hidden gem · Musée de Montmartre · 12–14 rue Cortot
Renoir lived here in 1875–1876
A garden in Van Gogh’s story
Hidden gem · La Bonne Franquette · 2 rue des Saules
Paris tourism office links the garden to Van Gogh’s La Guinguette, 1886
Faces becoming drawings
Hidden gem · Place du Tertre
Place du Tertre is known for its caricaturists
The quieter church next door
Architecture · Saint-Pierre de Montmartre · 2 rue du Mont-Cenis
Saint-Pierre de Montmartre, 2 rue du Mont-Cenis
Above the rooftops at Sacré-Cœur
Architecture · Parvis du Sacré-Cœur
Active sanctuary: respect prayer and services
The hill’s little shortcut
Hidden gem · Montmartre funicular · Square Louise-Michel
Funicular provides an alternative to the hillside steps
The man in the wall
Literary · Place Marcel-Aymé
Sculpture by Jean Marais, 1989
The deepest station in Paris
Hidden gem · Place des Abbesses
Original Guimard entrance canopy
Vincent's window on the hill
Literary · 54 rue Lepic
Van Gogh lived here 1886–1888
The little cinema that scandalised Paris
Hidden gem · 10 rue Tholozé
Opened 1928
The pink house of the painters
Hidden gem · 2 rue de l'Abreuvoir
Painted by Utrillo
Where the Commune began
Revolution · Rue des Rosiers
18 March 1871
The black cat that conquered the world
Music · 84 boulevard de Rochechouart
Le Chat Noir opened 1881
Birthplace of the cancan
Music · 82 boulevard de Clichy
Opened 1889
The smallest cemetery in Paris
Hidden gem · 2 rue du Mont-Cenis
Opened 1688
The hill is full of holes
Hidden gem · The Butte Montmartre
Gypsum quarries under the Butte
Amélie's café
Hidden gem · 15 rue Lepic
Filming location of Amélie (2001)
The oldest street of the village
Medieval · Rue Saint-Rustique
Among the oldest lanes on the Butte
Île de la Cité · 15 stories
Point Zero of France
Hidden gem · Parvis Notre-Dame
Distances from Paris are measured from here
Notre-Dame, reborn
Medieval · Parvis Notre-Dame
Construction began 1163
A city beneath your feet
Hidden gem · Parvis Notre-Dame (archaeological crypt)
Opened 1980
Charlemagne and his knights
Medieval · Parvis Notre-Dame, by the Seine
Bronze by Louis & Charles Rochet
The oldest hospital in Paris
Memory · 1 parvis Notre-Dame
Traditionally founded c. 651
The flower and bird market
Hidden gem · Place Louis-Lépine
Market since 1808
The oldest public clock in Paris
Medieval · Corner of boulevard du Palais & quai de l'Horloge
First public clock in Paris, 1370s
Marie-Antoinette's last prison
Revolution · 2 boulevard du Palais
Part of the medieval Palais de la Cité
A jewel box for a crown
Architecture · 10 boulevard du Palais
Consecrated 1248
Place Dauphine
Hidden gem · Place Dauphine
Begun 1607
The 'New Bridge' is the oldest
Architecture · Pont Neuf
Completed 1607
A king with secrets inside
Revolution · Pont Neuf, statue of Henri IV
Original 1614, melted 1792
The curse of the Templars
Medieval · Square du Vert-Galant (plaque by the steps)
Executed March 1314
Héloïse and Abélard
Literary · 9 quai aux Fleurs
12th-century lovers
Memorial to the Deportation
Memory · Square de l'Île-de-France
Inaugurated 1962
Île Saint-Louis · 12 stories
An island made of two
Hidden gem · Pont Marie
Formerly Île Notre-Dame and Île aux Vaches
Berthillon
Hidden gem · 29–31 rue Saint-Louis-en-l'Île
Founded 1954
The church with a pierced spire
Architecture · 19 bis rue Saint-Louis-en-l'Île
Begun 1664
The Hashish Club
Literary · 17 quai d'Anjou
Built 1650s
Hôtel Lambert
Architecture · 2 rue Saint-Louis-en-l'Île
Le Vau, 1640s
Camille Claudel's studio
Memory · 19 quai de Bourbon
Studio 1899–1913
The headless woman
Hidden gem · Corner of rue Le Regrattier & quai de Bourbon
Street once named rue de la Femme-sans-Tête
The busker's bridge
Music · Pont Saint-Louis
Current bridge 1970
Marie Curie's home
Memory · 36 quai de Béthune
Lived here 1912–1934
A president at home
Memory · 24 quai de Béthune
Pompidou lived here; died 1974
Saint Geneviève watches the river
Medieval · Pont de la Tournelle
Statue by Paul Landowski, 1928
Square Barye
Hidden gem · Square Barye
Named after sculptor Antoine-Louis Barye
Opéra · 15 stories
Palais Garnier
Architecture · Place de l'Opéra
Competition 1861
The lake beneath the opera
Hidden gem · Palais Garnier
Water tank under the stage
The falling chandelier
Literary · Palais Garnier, west side
Counterweight fell in 1896
Café de la Paix
Literary · 5 place de l'Opéra
Opened 1862
A dome of stained glass
Architecture · 40 boulevard Haussmann
Dome 1912
Printemps
Architecture · 64 boulevard Haussmann
Founded 1865
The birth of cinema
Hidden gem · 14 boulevard des Capucines
28 December 1895
Where Impressionism got its name
Architecture · 35 boulevard des Capucines
First Impressionist exhibition, 1874
The Olympia
Music · 28 boulevard des Capucines
Opened 1893
Harry's New York Bar
Hidden gem · 5 rue Daunou
Opened 1911
A column made of cannons
Revolution · Place Vendôme
Austerlitz cannon bronze
Chopin's last home
Music · 12 place Vendôme
Died here 17 October 1849
A temple that became a church
Architecture · Place de la Madeleine
52 columns
Passage des Panoramas
Hidden gem · 11 boulevard Montmartre
Opened 1799
Musée Grévin
Hidden gem · 10 boulevard Montmartre
Opened 1882