pariisi:
Photo of the Paris Exposition: Champ de Mars and Palace of Metallurgy, Paris, France, 1900 from the Brooklyn Museum
by What I Like on pinterest.com
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frenchhistory:
Théatre des Champs Elysées, Paris, France
@credits
The Théâtre des Champs-Élysées is a theatre at 15 avenue Montaigne. Despite its name, the theatre is not on the Champs-Élysées but nearby in another part of the 8th arrondissement of Paris.
Opened in 1913, it was designed by French architect Auguste Perret and founded by journalist and impresario Gabriel Astruc to provide a venue suitable for contemporary music, dance and opera, in contrast to traditional, more conservative, institutions like the Paris Opera. It hosted the Ballets Russes for its first season, staging the world première of the Rite of Spring on Thursday May 29, 1913, thus becoming the celebrated location of one of the most famous of all classical music riots.
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frenchhistory:
Château de Compiègne
@credits
The Castle of Compiègne is a French château, a royal residence built for Louis XV and restored by Napoleon. Compiègne was one of three seats of royal government, the others being Versailles and Fontainebleau. It is located in Compiègne in the Oise département, and open to the public.
Even before the château was constructed, Compiègne was the preferred summer residence for French monarchs, primarily for hunting given its proximity to Compiègne Forest. The first royal residence was built in 1374 for Charles V and a long procession of successors both visited it and modified it. Louis XIV resided in Compiègne some 75 times. Louis XV was perhaps even more favorably impressed; the Comte de Chevergny described his infatuation: “Hunting was his main passion… and Compiègne, with its immense forest, with its endless avenues amongst the trees, with its stretches down which you could ride all day and never come to the end, was the ideal place to indulge that passion.”
In 1750, prominent architect Ange-Jacques Gabriel proposed a thorough renovation of the château. Work began in 1751 and was finished in 1788 by Gabriel’s student Le Dreux de La Châtre. The ancient town ramparts dictated the château’s triangular plan; the resultant building covers about 5 acres (20,000 m2). It is Neoclassical in style, with simplicity and clarity governing both its external and interior features.
During the French Revolution, the château passed into the jurisdiction of the Minister for the Interior. In 1795 all furniture was sold and its works of art were sent to the Muséum Central; it was essentially gutted. Napoleon visited in 1799 and again in 1803. In 1804 the château became an imperial domain and in 1807 he ordered it be made habitable again. Architects Berthault, Percier and Fontaine, decorators Dubois and Redouté, and cabinetmakers Jacob-Desmalter and Marcion restored the château. Its layout was altered, a ballroom added, and the garden was replanted and linked directly to the forest.
The result is an example of First French Empire style (1808-1810), though some traces of the earlier décor survive. Auguste Luchet remarked that “Compiègne speaks of Napoleon as Versailles does of Louis XIV”. From 1856 on, Napoleon III and Eugénie made it their autumn residence, and redecorated some rooms in the Second Empire style.
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Anonymous asked :
Do you know of any royal person in French history who was gay?
Of course ! Though, it’s hard to “label” them as gay considering how fluid sexuality was at the time. Let’s say that these are known for sexy times with same sex people :p
- Louis XIII
- Henri II de Bourbon-Condé
- Henri III
- Philippe d’Orléans
- Monsieur frère de Louis XIV
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Anonymous asked :
Do you know of any book, film, or some sort of information about the gay/lesbian life during La Belle Epoque?
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frenchhistory:
Virtual exhibition about women who worked at the Institut Pasteur
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frenchhistory:
dreamer-of-impossible-dreams:
bloggish:
Sometimes countries are monarchies
Sometimes countries are republics
Sometimes are empires
Sometimes countries transition from one of these forms of government to another
And then there’s France:
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Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
Famous pilot and author of Le Petit Prince.
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STÉPHANE HESSEL - Stéphane Hessel, l’auteur de “Indignez-vous”, est mort dans la nuit du mardi 26 au mercredi 27 février à l’âge de 95 ans, a-t-on appris mercredi. L’ancien diplomate et résistant, “est mort dans la nuit”, a annoncé à l’AFP son épouse Christiane Hessel-Chabry.
La mort de cet ancien résistant, porté aux nues par le succès d’édition de son fascicule “Indignez-vous” mais aussi parfois critiqué pour ses prises de position contre Israël, a immédiatement ému la quasi totalité de la classe politique.
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Anonymous asked :
pluzz = documentaire sur le mystère de la tête d'Henri IV
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Maison Le Foll, crémerie à Reims. Devanture, un couple se tient sur le pas de la porte. Photographie prise par Fernand Cuville en 1917.
@credits
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frenchhistory:
French opera singer Caroline Branchu (1780-1850) as Julia in “La Vestale” by Gaspare Spontini (1774-1851)
@credits
Alexandrine-Caroline Branchu (November 2, 1780 – October 14, 1850) was a French opera soprano. She was born in Cap-Haïtien, Haïti at a time when Haiti was a French colony. A gifted vocalist, for the better part of the first quarter of the 19th century, she was the leading soprano at the Paris Opéra.
Branchu was one of the first students at the Paris Conservatoire after it opened in 1795, and studied singing under Pierre Garat.
Although Branchu frequently performed works by Christoph Willibald Gluck and was notable for the Anacreon overture and Les Abencérages by Luigi Cherubini, she is best remembered for her performances in the title role of Gaspare Spontini’s most important opera, La vestale (1807). She also performed in Spontini’s Fernand Cortez (1809) and Olympie (1819). She was briefly a mistress of Napoleon.
Branchu died in the Parisian suburb of Passy and was buried in the Père Lachaise Cemetery.
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