If you choose to independently tour the Palais Garnier, we’d suggest going for an audio guided tour.

Viewed through this lens, Palais Garnier sure feels like a ‘sign’ of its time. The Palais Garnier till today remains an iconic symbol of Paris, not just for its magnificent façade and lavish interior, but for the era it represents: a France that had weathered a century of disruption and revolution. The Opera Garnier was part palace, part temple, part administrative center a space where money was the new king, the new power, the new god. At the time it opened, Palais Garnier was the world's largest theatre and opera house. In the late 19th century French society, one did not go to the Opera to view the mastery and grace of artists but to show off your wealth and power to be aroused.Īfter 15 years of construction plagued by setbacks like the 1870-71 Franco-Prussian War and Siege of Paris, the Paris Commune, ultimate fall of France’s second Empire, and an 1873 fire the Palais Garnier was inaugurated on Januray 5, 1875. The Palais Garnier is a blend of architectural styles and the freedom endowed on Charles to experiment with a totally atypical dimension allowed this to manifest. This was keeping in mind France’s late 19th century, post-revolutionary, industrialized society. The intention was to keep the Palais Garnier as a place for the wealthy and powerful where the rich would aspire to be spotted. Out of the 171 proposals submitted, Charles Garnier a little-known 35-year-old architect won the comission to build Paris’s Opera House.Ĭharles Garnier’s winning architectural plan devised mounting a spectacle a within a spectacle, in lieu with Napoleon III ‘s bourgeoisie tastes.

A contest was organised to attract proposals for the construction of the Palais Garnier. Palais Garnier’s history dates back to 1860, under the auspices of Emperor Napoleon III as a part of civic planner Baron Haussmann’s plan to renovate and transform all of Paris.

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