More than just the Mona Lisa

The Musée du Louvre—One of the world's greatest museums

Anyone up for the greatest museum on Earth? The Grand Louvre—a former royal palace opened to the public as an art gallery when the Revolution struck—has 60,000 square meters of galleries displaying more than 30,000 works spanning 3 millennia, all of it seen by 8.5 million people each year, making it the world's most visited museum.

In a word: big.

Besides one of the world's top painting galleries, the Louvre also houses a remarkable collection of antiquities from Greece, Etruria, Rome, Egypt, and the Orient; a sculpture section that boasts two of Michelangelo's Slaves; and a fine decorative arts division.

It would take about three days to properly scratch the surface of all seven departments. Heck, it takes at least half a day merely to walk through the halls to see da Vinci's enigmatically smiling Mona Lisa, that ancient Greek armless beauty Venus de Milo, and the dramatic Winged Victory of Samothrace—just the three most famous of many instantly recognizable artistic icons that call the Louvre home.

The floor plans and information desks on site will help you get a handle on the basic layout and plan your visit, but here's one tip. The Louvre's problem is that there are too many masterpieces.

To avoid aesthetic overload, and since you can only absorb so much, on a first visit you will probably have to pretty much ignore most of the works you're passing—pieces that might have been the pride of a lesser museum—in order to devote your art appreciation energies to the greatest hits.

These include an incredible five more da Vinci paintings (the Virgin of the Rocks is stupendous), fragments from Athens' Parthenon, Ingres' The Turkish Bath, Veronese's Wedding Feast at Cana, Vermeer's Lacemaker, Self-portraits by Dürer and Rembrandt, one-third of Uccello's Battle of San Romano (the other thirds are in Florence and London), Géricault's Raft of the Medusa, and David's Coronation of Napoléon I.

Look, if you have the time, try to take in the Louvre over several visits. In the long run, it's worth the multiple admissions (though you needn't pay over and over if you use the highly recommended Paris Museum Pass).

Main entrance: under the glass pyramid in the Cour Napoléon courtyard, between the qaui du Louvre and rue de Rivoli.
Métro: Palais-Royal—Musée du Louvre
tel. +33-(0)1-40-20-84-58
www.louvre.fr
Closed Tuesdays
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Tips

• Planning your time: Honestly? I'd budget a full day for the Louvre. Heck, I'd return for two days (though not back-to-back). The Louvre ranks high on the short list of the top museums in the entire world—arguably, it could be placed at the top spot. Still, on a super-tight schedule, you could get away with spending just 3–4 hours in the Louvre. If your interest lies more in having checked the Mona Lisa off your sightseeing list than in actually spending time admiring all the other art, you could—it kills me to say this—rush through in just 45–60 minutes (but do try and give the art a chance, OK?). ( on Paris Itineraries.)
  
  
• Free admission with a sightseeing discount card: Get into the Louvre for free (and skip the line at the ticket booth) with either the Paris Sightseeing Pass or the Paris Museum Pass.
  
  
• Take a tour of the Louvre with our partners at Viator.com:
  • Skip the Line: Paris Louvre Museum Guided Tour
  • Skip the Line: Louvre Museum Walking Tour including Venus de Milo and Mona Lisa
  • Skip the Line: Paris Louvre Museum and Da Vinci Code Small Group Tour
  • Paris in One Day Sightseeing Tour (includes 2 river cruises, Louvre, Eiffel Tower lunch, and Notre-Dame)
  • Paris City Tour by Minivan, Louvre Museum and Seine River Lunch Cruise
  • Paris Walking Tour - Da Vinci Code (enter the Carrousel public areas, but no the museum collections)
  • Paris City Hop-on Hop-off Tour (no site entry)
  • Paris L'Open Hop-On-Hop-Off Tour (no site entry)
  • Paris City Segway Tour (no site entry)
  • Paris Walking Tour: Classic Paris (no site entry)
    
    
• Use a less-crowded entrance: The Louvre's western entrances at Carrousel (in the open courtyard) and Porte des Lions (in the southern wing; closed Fridays) are far less crowded than the main Pyramid entrance, and still have ticket windows. Holders of sightseeing passes or advance tickets can also use the Passage Richelieu entrance just to the north of the Pyramid in the main body of the northern wing (no ticket sales, though).
  
  

• Late hours: The Louvre stays open open late Wednesday and Friday nights. Rather than closing at the usual 6pm, it closes at 10pm. Note that, no matter what time the museum itself closes, they start closing the outer galleries 30 minutes early, effectively herding visitors toward the central part of the museum to exit.
  

• The Louvre for free: Admission to the Louvre is free—and the museum is intensely crowded—on the first Sunday of every month.
  
  

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