The architectural heritage of France—local, regional, national, European—is part of what makes this the world’s number one tourist destination and what makes Paris such as magnificent walking city. But should that architectural heritage be maintained at all cost?

Protest and Progress A letter protesting the construction of the Eiffel Tower was published in Paris on February 14, 1887, less than three weeks after Gustave Eiffel broke ground on the tower that would far [...]

Paris has historical bridges, elegant bridges, workaday bridges, metro bridges, and pedestrian bridges; it has stone bridges, iron bridges, and 2-, 3-, and 5-span bridges. And it has one most evocative bridge in its Mirabeau [...]

The March equinox, also known as the vernal or spring equinox in the Northern Hemisphere, occurred today. That’s the moment when the sun is directly in line with the equator; day and night are of [...]

“Lafayette, we are here!” Those words are often attributed to U.S. General John Pershing when, on July 4, 1917, having arrived in France with the American Expeditionary Force upon the U.S. entrance into WWI, he [...]

Far less known than the Sainte Chapelle in Paris is France’s other great Sainte Chapelle of France, the royal chapel at the Chateau de Vincennes, which reopened on May 13, 2009, after nine years of restoration.

During my backpacking days in the early 80s, I developed a fondness for the bustle of European train stations, the excitement of currency change, the stock-broker-like fascination for the names up on the big board, [...]

Across the street from the Louvre, the Palais Royal, its court of honor and garden, and their surroundings are a stunning microcosm of culture in Paris: its history a background for its present, its present a dialogue with its past, its future clearly in need of change… but gently, please.