page_title: French Restoration style
section_title: Commercial architecture - the shopping gallery
hierarchical_section_title: French Restoration style / Architecture and design / Commercial architecture - the shopping gallery
caption_attribution_description: The popularity of the Galeries of the Palais Royal dates back to the late eighteenth century, when Parisians visited the arcades at all hours in search of entertainment. Remaining open until 2 in the morning, the Galeries featured circus-like attractions, in addition to 180 boutiques. In an attempt to rid the garden of prostitutes and criminals, Louis-Philippe orchestrated the closing of a portion of the arcades in 1828, and opened the Galerie d'Orléans in 1830, shown here. Its cover consisted of a glass roof and it was said to be the most architecturally spectacular of all of the arcades at the time. The structure's impressive combination of iron and glass, of classical yet advanced styles, is testimony to its architectural depth and complexity that influenced the construction of other arcades in Europe. However, due to its relatively poor location and competition with other arcades, the Galerie d'Orléans was one of the least successful arcades of the nineteenth century. It was partially demolished in 1935 in an attempt to restore life to the Palais-Royal, leaving an open courtyard in the first arrondissement.
context_page_description: The French Restoration style was predominantly Neoclassicism, though it also showed the beginnings of romanticism in music and literature. The term describes the arts, architecture, and decorative arts of the Bourbon Restoration period, during the reign of Louis XVIII and Charles X from the fall of Napoleon to the July Revolution of 1830 and the beginning of the reign of Louis-Philippe.
context_section_description: A new form of commercial architecture had appeared at the end of the 18th century; the passage, or shopping gallery, a row of shops along a narrow street covered by a glass roof. They were made possible by improved technologies of glass and cast iron, and were popular since few Paris streets had sidewalks and pedestrians had to compete with wagons, carts, animals and crowds of people.  The first indoor shopping gallery in Paris had opened at the Palais-Royal in 1786;  rows of shops, along with cafes and the first restaurants,  were located under the arcade around the garden.  It was followed by the passage Feydau in 1790–91,  the passage du Caire in 1799, and the Passage des Panoramas in 1800.   In 1834 the architect Pierre-François-Léonard Fontaine carried the idea a step further, covering an entire courtyard of the Palais-Royal, the Galerie d'Orleans, with a glass skylight. The gallery remained covered until 1935.  It was the ancestor of the glass skylights of the Paris department stores of the later 19th century.
caption: The Galerie d'Orleans at the Palais-Royal (1818–29), a shopping arcade covered with a glass roof, by Pierre-François-Léonard Fontaine
exif: {"Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "300", "Image YResolution": "300", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image ExifOffset": "90", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "1702", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "2246"}