9 Best Sights in The Marais, Paris

If it has to do with Parisian history, it's here: this fascinating hodgepodge of artifacts and art ranges from prehistoric canoes used by the Parisii tribes to the cork-lined bedroom where Marcel Proust labored over his evocative novels. Thanks to scores of paintings, drawings, photographs, furniture, and scale models, nowhere else in Paris can you get such a precise picture of the city's evolution through the ages. The museum fills more than 100 rooms in two adjacent mansions, the Hôtel Le Peletier de St-Fargeau and the Hôtel Carnavalet. The latter is a Renaissance jewel that was the home of writer Madame de Sévigné from 1677 to 1696. Throughout her long life, she wrote hundreds of frank and funny letters to her daughter in Provence, giving an incomparable view of both public and private life during the time of Louis XIV. The museum offers a glimpse into her world, but its collection covers far more than just the 17th century. The exhibits on the Revolution are especially interesting, with scale models of guillotines and a replica of the Bastille prison carved from one of its stones. Louis XVI's prison cell is reconstructed along with mementos of his life, even medallions containing locks of his family's hair. Other impressive interiors are reconstructed from the Middle Ages through the rococo period and into Art Nouveau—showstoppers include the Fouquet jewelry shop and the Café de Paris's original furnishings. From May through September, the museum's sculpted courtyard garden is home to Fabula café and restaurant, a delightful place for a coffee, snack, or meal in one of the Marais's prettiest gardens ( 16 rue des Francs-Bourgeois).

Home to the world’s largest public collection of Picasso’s inimitable oeuvre, this spectacular museum covers almost 54,000 square feet in two buildings: the splendid 17th-century Hôtel Salé and a sprawling structure in the back garden dedicated to temporary exhibitions. Diego Giacometti’s exclusively designed furnishings in the former are a bonus. The 200,000-plus paintings, sculptures, drawings, documents, and other archival materials (most of them donated to the City of Paris by Picasso or his family members) span the artist's entire career. Although it doesn't include his most recognizable works, it does contain many of the pieces Picasso himself treasured most. The first two floors cover his work from 1895 to 1972. The top floor illustrates his relationship to his favorite artists: landscapes, nudes, portraits, and still life works taken from his private collection detail his "artistic dialogue" with Cézanne, Gauguin, Degas, Rousseau, Matisse, Braque, Renoir, Modigliani, Miró, and others. The basement centers on Picasso’s workshops, with photographs, engravings, paintings, and sculptures that document or evoke key pieces created at the Bateau Lavoir, Château de Boisgeloup, Grands-Augustins, Villa La Californie, and his farmhouse, Notre-Dame-de-Vie, in Mougins. With excellent temporary exhibitions and plenty of multimedia components and activities that cater to kids, this is ideal for children and adult art lovers alike. Buy tickets online well in advance of your planned visit. Also, try to avoid visiting on weekends, when the crowds are largest.

The oldest square in Paris and—dare we say it—the most beautiful, Place des Vosges represents an early stab at urban planning. The precise proportions offer a placid symmetry, but things weren't always so calm here. Four centuries ago, this was the site of the Palais des Tournelles, home to King Henry II and Queen Catherine de Medici. The couple staged regular jousting tournaments, and Henry was fatally lanced in the eye during one of them in 1559. Catherine fled to the Louvre, abandoning her palace and ordering it destroyed. In 1612, the square became Place Royale on the occasion of Louis XIII's engagement to Anne of Austria. Napoléon renamed it Place des Vosges to honor the northeast region of Vosges, the first in the country to pony up taxes to the Revolutionary government. At the base of the 36 redbrick-and-stone houses—nine on each side of the square—is an arcaded, covered walkway lined with art galleries, shops, and cafés. There's also an elementary school, a synagogue (whose barrel roof was designed by Gustav Eiffel), and several chic hotels. The formal, gated garden's perimeter is lined with chestnut trees; inside are a children's play area and a fountain. Aside from hanging out in the park, people come here to visit the house, now a museum, of the man who once lived at No. 6—Victor Hugo, the author of Les Misérables and Notre-Dame de Paris (aka The Hunchback of Notre-Dame).  One of the best things about this park is that you're actually allowed to sit—or snooze or snack—on the grass during spring and summer. There is no better spot in the Marais for a picnic: you can pick up fixings at the nearby street market on Thursday and Sunday morning. (It's on Boulevard Richard Lenoir between Rues Amelot and St-Sabin.) The most likely approach to Place des Vosges is from Rue de Francs-Bourgeois, the main shopping street. However, for a grander entrance, walk along Rue St-Antoine until you get to Rue de Birague, which leads directly into the square.

Since legendary couturier Azzedine Alaïa's death in 2017, his atelier—tucked away on a quiet leafy street—has become a pilgrimage spot for those who revered his exquisite, masterfully tailored couture and ready-to-wear masterpieces. Housed in a soaring glass-roofed building, the foundation mounts brilliant exhibitions dedicated to Alaïa, whose luxurious, form-fitting creations enhanced the silhouettes of generations of fashion icons from Greta Garbo to Naomi Campbell. You’ll also want to peruse the foundation's superb bookstore and the cozy café serving lunch, coffee, and drinks inside or in the leafy courtyard in warm weather.

Henri Cartier-Bresson, the legendary artist-photojournalist and co-creator of the Magnum photo agency, launched this foundation with his wife Martine Franck, a British-Belgian portrait and documentary photographer, and their daughter Melanie. The soaring, light-filled gallery showcases a collection of 50,000 original prints along with an exceptional series of solo exhibitions from notable photographers. The foundation's bookstore itself is a draw for photography buffs.

Much of the credit for the city's ascendancy as a hub of international photography goes to Maison Européenne de la Photographie (MEP). Set in a landmark 17th-century mansion with a contemporary addition, MEP hosts up to four simultaneous exhibitions, which change about every three months, along with theme visits, workshops, and programs for kids. Shows feature an international crop of photographers and video artists. Works by superstar Annie Leibovitz or the late designer-photographer Karl Lagerfeld may overlap with a collection of self-portraits by an up-and-coming artist, and there are also regular retrospectives of photos by Doisneau, Cartier-Bresson, Man Ray, and other classics from MEP's vast private collection. The center has an excellent library, bookstore, and a café that spills out into the courtyard in warm months. Programs are available in English, and English-language tours are sometimes offered.

The first installation in this compelling memorial and museum is the deeply moving Wall of Names, tall plinths honoring the 76,000 French Jews deported from France to Nazi concentration camps, of whom only 2,500 survived. Opened in 2005, the center has an archive on the victims, a library, and a gallery hosting temporary exhibitions. The permanent collection includes riveting artifacts and photographs from the camps, along with video testimony from survivors. The children's memorial is particularly poignant and not for the faint of heart—scores of backlit photographs show the faces of many of the 11,000 murdered French children. The crypt, a giant black marble Star of David, contains ashes recovered from the camps and the Warsaw ghetto. You can see the orderly drawers containing small files on Jews kept by the French police. (France officially acknowledged the Vichy government's role only in 1995.) The history of anti-Semitic persecution in the world is revisited, as well as the rebounding state of Jewry today. There is a free guided tour in English the second Sunday of every month at 3.

This excellent museum traces the tempestuous backstory of French and European Jews through art and history. Housed in the refined 17th-century Hôtel St-Aignan, exhibits have good explanatory texts in English, but the free English audio guide adds another layer of insight; guided tours in English are also available on request (€4 extra). Highlights include 13th-century tombstones excavated in Paris; a wooden model of a destroyed Eastern European synagogue; a roomful of early paintings by Marc Chagall; and Christian Boltanski's stark two-part tribute to Shoah (Holocaust) victims in the form of plaques on an outer wall naming the (mainly Jewish) inhabitants of the Hôtel St-Aignan in 1939, and canvas hangings with the personal data of the 13 residents who were deported and died in concentration camps. The museum also mounts excellent temporary exhibitions, like the recent "Chagall, Modigliani, Soutine: Paris as a School, 1940." The rear-facing windows offer a view of the Jardin Anne Frank. To visit the garden, use the entrance on Impasse Berthaud, off Rue Beaubourg, just north of Rue Rambuteau.

Mark this down as one of Paris's most distinctive—and fascinating—collections around the theme of "humans and nature." The museum, housed in the gorgeous 17th-century Hôtel de Guénégaud, features lavishly appointed rooms stocked with animal- and hunt-theme art and sculpture by the likes of Rubens and Gentileschi, as well as antique weaponry and taxidermy interspersed with contemporary works by artists such as Jeff Koons, Sophie Calle, and Walton Ford. In a tribute to Art Nouveau, the decor incorporates chandeliers and railings curled like antlers. Older kids will appreciate the jaw-dropping Trophy Room's impressive menagerie of beasts, not to mention the huge polar bear stationed outside. There is a lovely multimedia exhibit on the myth of the unicorn, as well as charming interactive displays on antique weaponry and bird calls. Temporary exhibits take place on the first floor, with works scattered throughout the permanent collection. There's also a spacious café.