page_title: Louvre Palace
section_title: The complex
hierarchical_section_title: Louvre Palace / Description / The complex
caption_attribution_description: Aerial photograph of Palais du Louvre in Paris
context_page_description: The Louvre Palace is a former royal palace located on the Right Bank of the Seine in Paris, between the Tuileries Gardens and the church of Saint-Germain l'Auxerrois. Originally a fortress built in the medieval period, it became a royal palace in the fourteenth century under Charles V and was used from time to time by the kings of France as their main Paris residence. Its present structure has evolved in stages since the 16th century. In 1793 part of the Louvre became a public museum, now the Musée du Louvre, which has expanded to occupy most of the building.
context_section_description: The present-day Louvre Palace is a vast complex of wings and pavilions on four main levels which, although it looks to be unified, is the result of many phases of building, modification, destruction and restoration. The Palace is situated in the right-bank of the River Seine between Rue de Rivoli to the north and the Quai François Mitterrand to the south. To the west is the Jardin des Tuileries and, to the east, the Rue de l'Amiral de Coligny, where its most architecturally famous façade, the Louvre Colonnade, and the Place du Louvre are found. The complex occupies about 40 hectares and forms two main quadrilaterals which enclose two large courtyards: the Cour Carrée (Square Courtyard), completed under Napoleon I, and the larger Cour Napoléon (Napoleon Courtyard) with the Cour du Carrousel to its west, built under Napoleon III. The Cour Napoléon and Cour du Carrousel are separated by the street known as the Place du Carrousel.
  The Louvre complex may be divided into the "Old Louvre": the medieval and Renaissance pavilions and wings surrounding the Cour Carrée, as well as the Grande Galerie extending west along the bank of the Seine; and the "New Louvre": those 19th-century pavilions and wings extending along the north and south sides of the Cour Napoléon along with their extensions to the west (north and south of the Cour du Carrousel) which were originally part of the Palais des Tuileries (Tuileries Palace), burned during the Paris Commune in 1871.
  Some 51,615 sq m (555,000 sq ft) in the palace complex are devoted to public exhibition floor space.
caption: Aerial view of the Louvre Palace
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