The Rough Guide to Paris (Paperback)

It's little wonder that so many wistful songs have been penned over the years about France's capital. What city experiences could be more seductive than sitting in the gardens of Notre-Dame beneath the drifting cherry blossom, strolling the riverside quais on a summer evening, sipping coffee and cognac in the early hours to the sound of the blues, or exploring the ancient alleyways and cobbled lanes of the Latin Quarter and Montmartre? Paris has no problem living up to the painted images and movie myths with which we're all familiar.

Nor does Paris falter in its reputation as a great hive of artistic and intellectual stimulation. World-class art collections at the Louvre and Muse d'Orsay, as well as the great many smaller museums devoted to individual artists and collectors, underscore an impressive roster of talents linked to the city - Delacroix, Ingres, Seurat, Degas, Van Gogh, Picasso, Braque and Gris are but a few. The new National Library, open to all, embodies a cultural attitude that both proclaims Parisian cleverness and invites you to share in it. And it is only the latest in a line of grand and often ground-breaking modern buildings - the Pompidou Centre, the Arab World Institute, among others - that assert modern architecture and design.

For the greatest work of art has to be the city itself. Two thousand years of shaping and reshaping have resulted in monumental buildings, sweeping avenues, grand esplanades and historic bridges. The fabric of the city has been fortunate throughout its history, spared the ravages of flood and fire and saved from Hitler's intended destruction. And it survives with a sense of continuity and homogeneity, as new sits comfortably against a backdrop of old, old against new - the glass Pyramid against the grand fortress of the Louvre, the Column of Liberty against the Opra Bastille. Time has acted as judge as buildings once swathed in controversy - the Eiffel Tower, the Sacr-Cur, the Pompidou Centre - have in their turn become symbols of the city. Yet for all the tremendous pomp and magnificence of its monuments, the city operates on a very human scale, with exquisite, secretive little nooks tucked away from the Grands Boulevards and very definite little communities revolving around games of boules, the local boulangerie, charcuterie and caf.

Some highlights

The backdrop of the streets is predominantly Neoclassical, the result of nineteenth-century development designed purposefully to reflect the power of the French state. But each period since has added, more or less discreetly, novel examples of its own styles - with Auguste Perret, Le Corbusier, Mallet-Stevens and Eiffel among the early twentieth-century innovators. In the closing decades of the same century, the architectural additions have been on a dramatic scale, producing new and major landmarks, and recasting down-at-heel districts into important centres of cultural and consumer life. Beaubourg (the Pompidou Centre), La Villette, La Grande Arche, the Opra Bastille, the Louvre Pyramid, the Institut du Monde Arabe and the new National Library have all expanded the dimensions of the city, pointing it determinedly towards the future as well as enhancing the monuments of the past.

Paris' museums and galleries number among the world's finest, and, with the tradition of state cultural endowment very much alive, their collections are among the best displayed. The art of conversion - the Muse d'Orsay from a train station, the Cit des Sciences from abattoirs, and spacious well-lit exhibition spaces from mansions and palaces - has given the great collections unparalleled locations. The Impressionists at the Muse d'Orsay and Marmottan, the moderns at the Palais de Tokyo, the ancients in the Louvre, Picasso and Rodin with their own individual museums - all repay a visit. In addition, there's the contemporary scene in the commercial galleries that fill the Marais, St-Germain, the Bastille and the area around the Champs-lyses, and an ever-expanding range of museums devoted to other areas of human endeavour - science, history, decoration, fashion and performance art.

Few cities can compete with the thousand and one cafs, bars and restaurants - from ultra-modern and designer-signed, to palatial, to traditional and scruffy - that line every Parisian street and boulevard. The restaurant choice is not just French, but includes a tempting range of cuisines that draws from every ethnic origin represented among the city's millions and caters to every pocket.

The city entertains best at night, with a deserved reputation for outstanding film and music. Paris' cinematic prowess is marked by annual film festivals. Music is equally revered, with nightly offerings of excellent jazz, top-quality classical, avant-garde experimental, international rock, West African soukous and French-Caribbean zouk, Algerian ra, and traditional chansons.

If you've time, venture out of the city to one of the worthy attractions detailed in Part Four of the guide. The region surrounding the capital - the le de France - holds cathedrals and chteaux that bear comparison with anything in Paris itself - Chartres, Versailles and Fontainebleau, for example. An equally accessible excursion from the capital is that most un-French of attractions, Disneyland Paris, which is covered in its own separate chapter.

The best time to visit Paris is largely a question of personal taste. The city has a more reliable climate than Britain, with uninterrupted stretches of sun (or rain) year round. However, while it maintains a vaguely southern feel for anyone crossing the English Channel, Mediterranean it is not. Winter temperatures drop well below freezing, with sometimes biting winds. If you're lucky, spring and autumn will be mild and sunny; in summer it can reach the 30sC (80sF).

In terms of pure aesthetics, winter sun is the city's most flattering light, when the pale shades of the older buildings become luminescent without any glare, and the lack of trees and greenery is barely relevant. By contrast, Paris in high summer can be choking, with the fumes of congested traffic becoming trapped within the high narrow streets, and the reflected light in the city's open spaces too blinding to enjoy.

If you visit during the French summer holidays, from July 15 to the end of August, you will find that large numbers of Parisians have fled the city. It's quieter then, but a lot of shops and restaurants will be closed. There is, too, the commercial calendar to consider - fashion shows, trade fairs and the like. Paris hoteliers warn against September and October, and finding a room even at the best of times can be problematic. Early spring, autumn if you book ahead, or the midwinter months will be most rewarding.