Musée d'Orsay: station history
Served by: RER C.
Did you know?
An underground RER C station in Paris, set beneath the former Orsay station, the terminus of the Compagnie du chemin de fer de Paris à Orléans, inaugurated for the 1900 Universal Exhibition. The architect Victor Laloux, first Grand Prix de Rome, designed the building, built from 1898 to 1900 by the contractor Léon Chagnaud: a metal glass roof hidden behind a richly decorated stone facade, three monumental statues representing Bordeaux, Toulouse and Nantes, the company's main destinations, and the Terminus hotel at the western end. The building was listed as a historic monument in 1978, after being registered in 1973.
Anecdote
Decorating the vault was only possible if only electric trains entered the station: steam locomotives therefore stopped at Austerlitz station. In 1939 the station handled only suburban traffic, and in the 1950s most platforms were disused. The abandoned vaults hosted film shoots, including Orson Welles's "The Trial", and after Abbé Pierre's appeal in 1954 the station was renamed "Gare de l'espoir" (Station of Hope). The Théâtre d'Orsay of the Renaud-Barrault company settled there, and the Hôtel Drouot auction rooms held their activities there during the rebuilding of Drouot. In the 1960s several demolition projects, including one by Le Corbusier, were set aside thanks to preservation efforts; the musée d'Orsay opened in 1986 and the RER station was linked to Invalides by a tunnel in 1979.
Audio guide
The Musée d 'Orsay, from the old train station to the largest impressionist museum
Inaugurated on 14 July 1900 for the Universal Exhibition, Gare d 'Orsay stands on the ruins of the Palais d 'Orsay, burned under the Commune. Facing the Louvre, architect Victor Laloux hides the metal structure behind a stone facade, with a luxury hotel above the quays.
But by 1939, platforms were too short for modern trains. The station served as a parcel shipping center, a movie set (Le Procès, by Orson Welles, 1962) and was nearly razed in the 1970s to make way for a hotel. She is finally saved and protected.
On December 1, 1986, the museum opened its doors: Monet, Degas, Renoir, Van Gogh, the whole history of art from 1848 to 1914 under the large glass roof. And the immense clock on the facade, a vestige of the station, offers a unique view of Paris.
Around Musée d'Orsay
- Jardin des Tuileries, 400 m away — A garden begun in 1564 for Catherine de' Medici and redesigned in 1664 by Le Nôtre around a central path and two basins. Listed as a historic monument in 1914, it broadly keeps that layout.
- Musée d'Orsay, 40 m away — A former Belle Époque railway station housing the world's richest collection of Impressionist art.