Le Marais

The Marais, the marsh, was drained and built on from the twelfth century and became the fashionable aristocratic quarter in the seventeenth, filling with hotels particuliers, private mansions built around courtyards behind plain street walls. The court moved to Versailles and the district declined, which is why Haussmann's rebuilding largely passed it by and the narrow medieval streets survived. It has been the centre of Jewish Paris since the nineteenth century, particularly around rue des Rosiers, and since the 1980s the centre of gay Paris. Place des Vosges, of 1612, is the oldest planned square in the city, arcaded on all four sides.

What you actually see

• Place des Vosges - the 1612 arcaded square, the oldest planned one in Paris.
• The hotels particuliers - mansions behind plain walls with courtyards inside.
• Rue des Rosiers - the Jewish quarter's street of bakeries and falafel.
• The medieval street plan - narrow lanes Haussmann never straightened.

When to go

Year-round; the Marais is one of the few Paris districts where many shops open on Sunday, which makes it busy then. Weekday mornings are quietest for walking.

Honest expectations

Most mansions are private or house institutions and cannot be entered; courtyards are sometimes visible from the gate. The main streets are crowded and increasingly given to chain retail. Sunday afternoons are packed.

Nearby

The Picasso Museum is in the quarter; Bastille lies southeast.