If you want to see Paris, but do not want to die from its beauty, then use the alternative option: see the Orangerie Museum and get inspired. This small but pretty art gallery will impress even the most sophisticated visitors.

The museum building is located in the Central place de La Concorde in the Tuileries garden. The Orsay Museum, which includes the Orangerie Museum, is very close by. The ideal option is to devote a whole day to art and plan a visit to two galleries at once, especially since their expositions overlap.

The name of the museum, as well as the exterior of the place where it is located, give a gentle hint at the unusual history of its creation. The building was built in 1852 as a greenhouse to store orange trees that decorated the garden of the Tuileries Palace and Park complex in winter. We can find out about the Botanical past by the large number of huge panoramic windows, which today provide the gallery halls with stunning natural light. After the fall of the Empire in 1870, this space was used as an exhibition, concert, and entertainment venue, as a warehouse and shelter for soldiers.

The Orangerie Museum was founded only in 1927. The first exhibition was dedicated to a series of paintings by the great French impressionist Claude Monet "Water Lilies". At the moment, it is probably the main exhibit of the gallery. The master gave his works as a present to his native country, but on the condition that all eight paintings in the series will always be exhibited together. France kept its promise. Today, all visitors to the museum are eager to admire the "Water Lilies" placed in a separate oval hall.

Gradually, the collection of the art institution was refilled and expanded, and today it has at least 150 paintings. It mainly presents works by prominent European Impressionists and post-Impressionists of the 20th century: Gauguin, Derain, Laurencin, Matisse, Modigliani, Monet, Picasso, Renoir, Rousseau, Cezanne, Sisley, Soutine, Utrillo, and other famous artists.

At the beginning of the 21st century, the Orangerie Museum was completely reconstructed. As a result of the changes, the basement of the gallery was significantly expanded, and the collection of Jean Walter and Paul Guillaume appeared.