Paris · self-guided walk

Island, Louvre, and Concorde

This default walk follows Paris's sacred and royal spine from Île de la Cité to the Louvre, Tuileries, and Concorde. It gives the strongest ninety minutes of medieval, royal, and revolutionary Paris in one sequence.

11 stops · 4.2 km · about 90 min

Distance and time are our curators' estimates for the whole walk, stops included.

The stops

The short version of each stop. In aiGuide, open Paris, choose “Island, Louvre, and Concorde” and tap Begin walking tour; then lock your phone, and each story starts as you reach the stop.

1. 1Notre-Dame de Paris

   High Gothic, 12th-14th centuries

   

   You stand at the symbolic heart of medieval Paris. Notre-Dame rises from the island where the city first concentrated power, and its scarred but restored stonework now carries both 13th-century ambition and the memory of the 2019 fire.

   • Construction began in 1163 under Bishop Maurice de Sully
   • Napoleon was crowned here in 1804

   Open in OpenStreetMap

2. 2Sainte-Chapelle

   Rayonnant Gothic, 13th century

   

   You enter a chapel built as a reliquary on architectural scale. Upstairs, the walls all but disappear into glass, because King Louis IX wanted light itself to proclaim the sacred prestige of the French monarchy.

   • Built between 1242 and 1248 for Louis IX
   • Designed to house the Crown of Thorns

   Open in OpenStreetMap

3. 3Conciergerie

   Medieval monarchy to French Revolution, 14th-18th centuries

   

   You face a building that changes character with every century. What began as a royal palace became a prison, and during the Terror thousands passed through these halls on their final journey to the guillotine.

   • Part of the former Palais de la Cité
   • Marie Antoinette was imprisoned here in 1793

   Open in OpenStreetMap

4. 4Pont Neuf

   Early modern Paris, late 16th-early 17th centuries

   

   You are on the bridge that taught Paris how a modern bridge could work. Pont Neuf was the first major Paris bridge built without houses, opening views that still feel surprisingly theatrical.

   • Construction began in 1578 and ended in 1607
   • It is the oldest surviving Seine bridge in Paris

   Open in OpenStreetMap

5. 5Place Dauphine

   Early modern Paris, early 17th century

   You step off the crowded bridge into a surprisingly intimate square. Place Dauphine feels residential rather than ceremonial, even though it was one of Henry IV's most ambitious early-modern planning projects.

   • Initiated in 1607 by Henry IV
   • Named for the future Louis XIII

   Open in OpenStreetMap

6. 6Square du Vert-Galant

   19th-century park on a medieval river site

   

   You descend to one of central Paris's best river-level surprises. The park feels almost detached from the city above, yet it sits directly under the bridge that announced modern Paris to itself.

   • Created in 1884 at the island's western tip
   • Named for Henry IV, the Vert-Galant

   Open in OpenStreetMap

7. 7Pont des Arts

   First Empire origins with late 20th-century reconstruction

   

   You stand on one of Paris's finest open-air balconies. The bridge is modern in its current form, but the idea of crossing here has linked art, river, and spectacle since Napoleonic times.

   • The first bridge here was built from 1802 to 1804
   • It was the first metal bridge in Paris

   Open in OpenStreetMap

8. 8Musée du Louvre

   Medieval fortress to royal palace to museum, 12th century onward

   

   You are not just at a museum but inside a political machine turned cultural treasury. The Louvre lets Paris convert monarchy, empire, and collecting into a single overwhelming destination.

   • Opened as a public museum in 1793
   • It originated as a fortress under Philip Augustus

   Open in OpenStreetMap

9. 9Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel

   First Empire, early 19th century

   

   You are looking at an imperial stage-prop that outlived its backdrop. When the Tuileries burned in 1871, the arch suddenly gained the long vista it was never meant to command alone.

   • Built between 1806 and 1808
   • Designed by Charles Percier and Pierre Fontaine

   Open in OpenStreetMap

10. 10Jardin des Tuileries

    Royal garden from the 16th century with 17th-century redesign

    

    You are walking through a garden designed for power and later claimed by the public. The long axis, ponds, and statuary still teach your body how ceremonial Paris wants to be experienced.

    • Created in 1564 for Catherine de' Medici
    • André Le Nôtre redesigned it in the 1660s

    Open in OpenStreetMap

11. 11Place de la Concorde

    Royal square transformed by Revolution and 19th-century redesign

    

    You stand where Paris has celebrated kings, killed monarchs, paraded armies, and reinvented itself in public. Few spaces carry so much French history so visibly in one glance.

    • Built from 1757 to 1772 to plans by Ange-Jacques Gabriel
    • Louis XVI was executed here in 1793

    Open in OpenStreetMap

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