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Exploring art often makes one hungry. Any art enthusiast understands that museum cafes can get very crowded, particularly during sold-out exhibitions. Additionally, some art galleries might not offer on-site dining options. The Art & Nosh Random List provides a selection of convenient and dependable nearby dining spots. Read below for where to find nosh around: Saatchi Gallery (Duke of York Square), SW3 Tate Modern, SE1 Tate Britain, SW1 Saatchi Gallery neighbourhood The west London Contemporary Art Gallery is a four minute walk from Sloane Square Tube (Circle & District Lines). It dominates the Duke of York Square, a chic shopping destination in the heart of Chelsea. It does not have a cafe within it's premises. The nearest eateries within the Duke of York Square are listed below. Visit the interactive map for more information. Duke of York Square, 80 King's Road, London The Penny Black - breakfast, brunch and coffee. Comptior Libanais - a reliable chain offering diners flavours of the Middle East and North Africa. Läderach - luxury chocolates. Polpo - Venetian inspired with small plates options. Manicomio - modern Italian. Cafe Linea - Restaurant, bar, bakery with terrace overlooking the greenery of the square. Vardo - all day breakfast to dinner menu. Prime location by King’s Road yet overlooking the wide spaces of the square. The Chelsea Groce r - independent grocery store with a deli. SoHo Home Studio - small cafe on ground floor For a casual unfussy option, the nearby Peter Jones Department Store has: The Café by Benugo : a sandwich and coffee outlet on the 2nd floor The Top Floor Restaurant : a spacious self service restaurant on 6th floor. More importantly, it has public restrooms! Art books Aside from the Saatchi Gallery Shop , nearby bookstores with an excellent offering of Art books: John Sandoe Books : a glorious independent bookstore since 1957. (2 minute walk) Taschen: Art and design books. (1 minute walk). For the energetic explorer intending to add shopping to the agenda, then the King's Road is also dotted with pubs, cafes and restaurants in between trendy labels. Tate Modern & Britain: Riverside vibe Views from Level 10, Tate Modern TATE MODERN Tube : Blackfriars (Circle and District Lines), 8 minute walk. Southwark (Jubilee Line), 11 minute Walk National Rail : Blackfrairs (Thameslink and Southeastern) (museum is 300m from South exit.) Within Tate Modern Riverside Terrace , River entrance. Pizza, Beer, Cocktails, Sodas. Corner , 1st Floor, Natalie Bell Building. Food, Drinks, Music, until late on Tuesdays to Saturdays. Expresso Bar , 3rd Floor, Natalie Bell Building. Coffee, Cake, Tea. Temporarily closed at the time of writing. (December 2025) Restaurant and Bar , 6th Floor, Natalie Bell Building. Modern British cuisine. Level 10 , 10th Floor, Natalie Bell Building. Hot & Cold Drinks, Snacks. Members: Level 1 Members Bar , 1st Floor, Blavatnik Building. Drinks and seasonal lunch menu. Saturdays and Sundays. Granville-Grossman Bar , 5th Floor, Natalie Bell Building. Drinks & seasonal lunch menu. Until late on Fridays and Saturdays. Please check Tate Modern Website for opening times and if certain spaces are closed for events. Tate Modern’s Turbine Hall. Nearby Tate Modern with riverside views Founder's Arms: Pub serving quintessentially British Pub Beer and food. And of course Sunday roasts. (3 minute walk) Pizza Express No explanation needed! A Pizza & pasta joint. (6 minute walk) Swan London : Linked to the Globe Theatre and offering views of the Thames. Casual bar food or more formal dining upstairs. Has an afternoon tea menu and a venue for private parties with river views. (6 minute walk) Zizzi Bankside : A chain of Italian-inspired restaurants, known for serving dishes like fresh pasta and crispy pizzas in a warm, rustic environment. (7 minute walk) Bankside view: Underside of nearby Blackfriars Railway Bridge…an artwork in itself! TATE BRITAIN Tube : Pimlico (Victoria Line), 9 minute walk. Victoria (Circle and District Lines), 19 minute walk. National Rail : Victoria (Southern, Southeastern & Gatwick Express), as above. Within Tate Britain A coffered glass dome, designed by Sidney R. J. Smith. Djanogly Café , lower ground floor. Sandwiches, Salads, Cakes, Hot & Cold Drinks. Plus a seasonal lunch menu. Members: Members Room , in the Rotunda. Sandwiches, Salads, Cakes, Hot & Cold Drinks. It too has a seasonal lunch menu. Around Tate Britain Morpeth Arms : Traditional Pub serving Young's ales. Built in 1845 and patronised by prison wardens from the then nearby Millbank Penitentiary, it is rumoured to have a "haunted" former cell corridor". It also has an upstairs venue space named "Spying Room" as it overlooks the MI6 building (SIS Building). (3 minute walk) Cafe Society : Italian cafe bistro serving Breakfast and Lunch and in-betweens until 7pm. (5 minute walk). If walking from Victoria Station, there are many Nosh options in and around Victoria: Check out the following areas and streets: Cardinal Place Shopping Centre Churton Street (special mention: Grumbles for British/French classics) Market Halls Victoria Sir Simon Milton Square (special mention: Casa do Frango for really decent Portuguese small plates) Wilton Street (special mentions: A. Wong for dim sum and Lorne for creative British) Tate Britain facade unadorned. Tate Britain f acade adorned with a neon light installation by artist Chila Kumari Singh Burman. The artwork, titled Remembering a Brave New World , was the museum's 2020 Winter Commission. (Updated December 2025)

The Long Now: Saatchi Gallery at 40 An extraordinary group exhibition honouring the London Gallery's dedication to contemporary art. It features special commissions, immersive installations, paintings, and sculptures - a sensory feast and occasionally a startling experience. Visit Saatchi Gallery's website for more information. The Saatchi Gallery as the backdrop. And the Royal Marsden Cancer Charity installation of 30,000 white roses creating the Ever After Garden. (November 2025) The Long Now Exhibition from: 05.11.2025 to 01.03.2026 (ticketed) Located on 1 & 2 floors Tube : Sloane Square (District & Circle Lines) Essentials : Typically, there are free exhibitions on the ground floor. Adequate restrooms. No cafe in the Gallery itself but lots of eateries within a short walking distance. Check out Duke of York Square. Selected Artworks from the Exhibition Frau am Tisch mit Früchten - Matisse, 2024 By André Butzer (b. 1973, Stuttgart, Germany) lives and works in Berlin. His work is characterised by a fusion of European Expressionism and American ready-made pop culture. With influences ranging from Paul Cézanne to Walt Disney, Butzer has developed an elaborate fictitious universe. The conceptual repetition and seeming seriality of his iconic characters speak to his continuous enquiry into societal contradictions and social non-conformity. Frau am Tisch mit Früchten-Matisse presents a single woman's head amidst a vast red interior with dispersed Mediterranean fruits coming in and out of appearance. In this cyclical process of passing and returning, nothing is lost. Everything is accommodated in the complete existence of the image, in which everything that was, is and will be, is present at the same time. In this temporal coherence, even the fruits are cyclically rounded in themselves and embody new beginnings - maturing, rebirth and renewed ripening. ( Text by Saatchi Gallery ) Casa Tomada (House Taken), 2019 Resin, fibreglass, wood, screen-cotton, rope, sand. and Gerreión coal By Kalael Gomezoaros (born 1972 Santa Marta, Colombia). The artist addresses the fragilty of the human condition and the history of violence in his native Colombia. Since its conception in 2008, Casa Tomada (House Taken) has been exhibited across the world - first displayed at Saatchi Gallery in Pangaea, (2014). It's title references the 1946 short story by Argentinian author Juio Cortázar, in which a house is gradually taken over, prompting the occupants to flee. Central to the artist's work is migration and forced displacement of human beings, originally made in response to the Colombian Civil War, Gómezbarros fashioned the ant bodies from casts of human skulls, which are covered with Colombian sand and bound together using strips of cotton from T-shirts, commonty worn by Colombian farm workers. The ant legs are made from the wragrant branches of the Jasmine tree. during the civil war, such branches were used to mask the smell of the bodies victims. ( Text by Saatchi Gallery ) The Long Now, 2025 By Martine Poppe (b. 1988, Oslo, Norway). Martine lives and works between London and Oslo. Her works emerge from the interplay of different materials, negotiating the boundaries between abstraction and representation. Climate is central to her subject matter, and her process often begins with photographs of nature that she digitally manipulates until they verge on becoming illegible. Translating these digital sketches to paintings with quick, regular strokes, Poppe's tactile surfaces capture the fragile and fleeting qualities of diffracted light, overexposure and the pixelation of blown-up digital images. She creates meditative spaces that feel simultaneously personal and universal, engaging both memory and imagination. Her work draws from photographs taken over the past decade, maintaining extensive archives of photographs which she revisits and edits. ( Text by Saatchi Gallery ) Omni, 2024 By Michael Raedecker (b. 1963, Amsterdam, The Netherlands). Michael seeks to make sense of the symbiotic and often parasitic relationship between nature and humanity - to understand our place in the world and draw attention to the proximity and power of nature in relation to the urban environment. Driven by craft and method as much as by imagery, Raedecker blends painting with richly textural embroidery to create his mixed-media works. The compositions he builds hold the urban in an uneasy balance with nature, which creeps and sprawls across the canvas, over open car doors, solitary sun loungers, and vacant pools. His paintings deal with the presence, but visual absence, of us in relation to our environment; the suburban setting where the landscape meets man-made dwellings. ( Text by Saatchi Gallery ) YARD Allan Kaprow's Yard marks a seminal moment in the history of contemporary culture. Advocating the blurring of art and life, in 1961 the American artist filled a New York courtyard with piles of discarded tyres, transforming the space into an artwork (an 'environment') and inviting visitors to climb, shift, and move through the work. Kaprow re-invented Yard and his other environments multiple times throughout his career until his passing in 2006. Here its 9th version, originally conceived in Italy in 2003 and including tences as architectural elements, is given a new reading in dialogue with monumental works by two important British artists. Hovering above, Conrad Shawcross's Golden Lotus (Inverted) , originally presented at Saatchi Gallery in 2019, rotates and resonates with MYLO's original soundtrack, serving as a vertical counterpoint to the field of tyres below and creating an interplay between its moving shadows and the participating audience. At the same time, Christopher Le Brun's vast canvas (not in the frame), Tristan , extends the dialogue into the realm of painting. Its dark, immersive surface evokes both landscape and interiority. Acting as a silent yet powerful presence, it further expands the tension between gravity and elevation within this space. Together these works form a distinctive and powerful meditation on immersion and transformation, generating an entirely new environment to explore the relationship between experience and image. They invite you to be a part of the installation, creating a sensory experience that is less about looking and more about being. "This spontaneous piece takes a flawed British supercar, conceived against a backdrop of extremely tumultuous economic times, as an iconic symbol of 1980s decadence and literally inverts it - transforming it into a joyful, irreverent act of rebellion against status quos." - Conrad Shawcross ( Curated by Philippa Adams and Piero Tomassoni. Saatchi Gallery ) The Way Home, 2000 By Tom Hunter (b. 1965, Dorset, UK). Tom is a London-based British artist working in photography and film. Hunter explores themes depicting his local neighbourhood of East London, drawing on art historical references. Hunter's series Life and Death in Hackney, 1991-2001, creates a melancholic beauty out of the post-industrial decay where the wild buddleia and sub-cultural inhabitants take root and bloom. The somewhat abandoned areas became epicentres of the new warehouse rave scene of the early 90's. The Way Home takes inspiration from John Millais's Ophelia , showing a young girl whose journey home from one such rave was curtailed by falling into the canal and losing herself to the dark slippery, industrial motorway of a bygone era. Through the influence of Pre-Raphaelite artists and the intertwining of beauty and nature, Hunter has reinvestigated a maligned inner city landscape to create an unusual chronicle of contemporary, urban Britain. ( Text by Saatchi Gallery ) Fun note: Taylor Swift’s The Fate of Ophelia may have also taken inspiration from Millais's Ophelia . Ballad for Water, 2025 By Ryan Mosley (b. 1980, Chesterfield, UK) . Ryan is a narrative painter based in Sheffield. Mosley uses pictorial cues - from beards, to brick walls and top hats - as triggers for art historical reference, class commentary, and pure formalism. The boat has been a recurring motif for Mosley in recent years, itself an evolution of the stage motif that remains a common setting in his paintings. As a mode of transport, it traverses time, rendering this scene in no fixed era or locale. It also enables the marriage of two long running themes in the artist's work; journeying and performance. Although we might discern from their number that the musicians may be the cargo of this vessel, we cannot conclude their origin, destination or broader identity and so they also sit astride history. Timeless in their garb and melodic practice. ( Text by Saatchi Gallery ) Aren’t the colours reminiscent of a Hockney? Can you spot the Jenny Savile? Titled Passage (2004), a work that holds both strength and beauty, and paradigmatically realises the artist’s ambition to “be a painter of modern life, and modern bodies”. (Saville, quoted in Rachel Cooke,  The Observer , 9 June 2012). ( Text by Saatchi Gallery ) Born in 1970 in Cambridge, England, Saville attended the Glasgow School of Art from 1988 to 1992, spending a term at the University of Cincinnati in 1991. In her depictions of the human form, Jenny Saville transcends the boundaries of both classical figuration and modern abstraction. 20:50 Richard Wilson's 20:50 returns with renewed force to Saatchi Gallery, presented for the first time on the Gallery's top floor. At first glance, the surface appears mirror-like, turning the room into a vast optical illusion. Originally created in 1987 and now considered one of Britain's most iconic installations, 20:50 holds up a reflection of ourselves and the world we inhabit. In today's climate crisis, this room, filled with recycled sump oil (the thick black engine oil drained from vehicle engines becomes a meditation on consumption and environmental uncertainty. Its title refers to the grade of the oil itself, but the experience it creates is far from industrial, prompting us to consider the coexistence of material excess and ecological fragility in the reality we live in today. 20:50 gathers the themes of the exhibition into one immersive encounter. The still surface captures a tension between presence and absence, beauty and unease, inviting us to pause within a moment of disorientation and reflection. Like the exhibition as a whole, Wilson's work reminds us that art does not simply record its time but unsettles it, offering new ways of seeing ourselves and our future. It is both an ending and a beginning - a space to reflect on forty years of the Gallery's history while looking ahead to the possibilities that lie beyond. (Updated November 2025)

The Fondation LV Retrospective (2025) The David Hockney 25 exhibition staged by Fondation Louis Vuitton (Fondation LV) ran f rom 09.04.2025 to 01.09.2025. It brought together more than 400 of his works created from 1955 to 2025. Visitors were greeted with a breathtaking retrospective in a variety of media including oil and acrylic painting, ink, pencil and charcoal drawing, digital art (works on iPhone, iPad, photographic drawings, etc) and immersive video installations.  30 Sunflowers, 1996 The Interview and Documentary by the BBC Watch his 26 minute interview by Katie Razzall. Bradford-born Hockney talks about why painting still makes him happy at ahead of his biggest show in Paris. For Hockney fans, the broadcasting station's documentary The Art of Seeing offers a wonderful insight on his exhibition A Bigger Picture at the Royal Academy, made up of works depicting the landscape of his native Yorkshire. Hockney exhibition dates for 2026 The Hockney website is a good place to find all upcoming exhibitions. 16 Dec 2025 - 11 Jan 2026 , Aviva Studios, Manchester, UK: The vibrant and immersive exhibition Bigger & Closer (not smaller & further away). (Ticketed). 12 March 2026 - 23 August 2026, Serpentine North, London, UK: The exhibition will showcase seminal works, shown in the UK for the first time. (Free). Selected artworks from the exhibition Portrait of an Artist (Pool with Two Figures), 1972. California Dreaming Compared to the cramped terraced houses of West Yorkshire and the rainy post-war dereliction of London, Los Angeles represented sunshine, freedom, and strong light. Inspired by old swimming pool cleaning manuals, palm trees, freeways and the space and scale of Southern California, the artist embarked on rendering the city and surrounding landscape in his own vision. Part observation, part fantasy in vivd acrylic. (Title reference: Song by the Mamas and the Papas. / Text by Fondation LV.) Pacific Coast Highway and Santa Monica, 1990 Multiple Twin Peaks David Hockney first visited the United States in 1961, when he spent the Summer in New York. He first visited Los Angeles a few years later, and settled there from the mid 1960s. He taught at the Universities of Iowa and Colorado respectively in 1964 and 1965. (Title reference: inspiration from T win Peaks , an American surrealist mystery-horror drama television series created by David Lynch and Mark Frost). Christopher Isherwood and Don Bachardy, 1968 Tête-à-tête This painting of the writer Christopher Isherwood and his companion, the painter Don Bachardy, is one of the most representative of David Hockney's double portraits. Depicted frontally, its quasi-stillness broken only by the movement of Isherwood's head, for the young Hockney they symbolize the freedom of Californian society, where a male couple of different ages could be seen in a relationship that today would be described as "open." (Title meaning: a private conversation between two people. / Text by Fondation LV.) Pearblossom Hwy., 11-18th April 1986 No. 2. A long way from Route 66 Driving north from Los Angeles, Hockney stopped along the Pearblossom Highway. There turning around on the spot, he aimed his camera at every detail, near and far, taking more than eight hundred photographs of the desert landscape surrounding him, encompassing the entire panorama, which he recomposed in the studio. According to the artist, this work was inspired by the way Cubist painters recomposed their subject from separate elements. The original collage of this print, created for this exhibition, is kept at the J. Paul Getty Museum. (Title reference: (Get Your Kicks on) Route 66" is a popular rhythm and blues song, composed in 1946 by American songwriter Bobby Troup. / Text by Fondation LV.) All about Chairs The Chair from 1985 powerfully fuses an eloquent tribute to past masters Vincent van Gogh, Paul Gauguin and Pablo Picasso with the striking subversion of traditional perspective that defines many of Hockney’s masterworks. (Text by Fondation LV.) Clockwise: 1. The Chair by David Hockney (1985). Private collection. 2. Van Gogh’s Chair by Vincent Van Gogh (1888). National Gallery Collection, London. 3. Gauguin’s chair by Vincent Van Gogh (1888). Van Gogh Museum Collection, Amsterdam. Me, Myself and David Left to right: Play Within a Play Within a Play and Me with a Cigarette, 2025 Self Portrait Standing with Red Braces, 2005 Self Portrait, 10th December 2021 (Title reference: inspiration from Me, Myself & Irene - a 2000 American slapstick black comedy film produced, co-written, and directed by the Farrelly brothers. Mirror, Mirror Self Portraits, 2012 Top to bottom and left to right No. 1200, 13th March 2012 Self Portrait IV, 25th March 2012 No. 1223, 21st March 2012 Self Portrait I, 13th March 2012 Self Portrait II, 16th March 2012 No. 1203, 14th March 2012 Self Portrait, 19th April 2012 Self Portrait I, 25th March 2012 No. 1216, 17th March 2012 No. 1194, 12th March 2012 Self Portrait II, 14th March 2012 Self Portrait, 10th March 2012 No. 1244, 6th April 2012 No. 1204, 15th March 2012 Self Portrait III, 20th March 2012 iPad drawings printed on paper, mounted on aluminium (Title reference for Star Trek fans: A famous 1967 episode where Captain Kirk and his crew are transported to an evil parallel universe.) Bigger Trees near Warter or/ou Peinture sur le Motif pour le Nouvel Age Post-Photographique, 2007 Into the Woods The complex process leading to the creation of this work—Hockney's largest to date— included several stages, beginning with meticulous observation, followed by a plein air preparatory sketoh for defining the framing of each of the fifty canvases. Then a sketched grid of the entire composition was produced , to guide the process. The goal was not to enlarge a sketoh but to paint on the spot, spontaneously and immediately, as the painters of the Barbizon School and the Impressionists had done. Hockney worked on six panels at the same time, which were then photographed, scanned, and combined on a computer to give an overall view. There were many challenges: Hookney's studio was then in the attic of his mother's house in Bridlington, and its size was such that only six paintings could be viewed at one time. Given oil paint's lengthy drying time, the trunk of the car that was being used to transport the works had to be adapted to carry canvases that were still wet. Working with the constraint of spring's arrival, which would of course transform the trees, Hookney completed the painting in six weeks, showing it in the summer of 2007 at the Royal Academy in London, before donating it to the Tate. (Title reference: Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine’s dazzling musical. / Text by Fondation LV.) Bigger Trees nearer Warter, Winter 2008 Perspectives This work, painted in March 2008, represents the same trees that can be seen above, while here they are seen in perspective in the grove's depths. (Text by Fondation LV.) Yorkshire Lad Top to bottom, left to right Rudston Trees II, 29 July 2005 Kilham to Langtoft, 2 August 2005 Langtoft to Kilham, 31 July 2005 Sledmere to Malton, 3 August 2005 Woldgate Vista, 27 July 2005 Kilham to Langtoft II, 27 July 2005 Kilham, 6 August 2005 Kilham to Langtoft, 25 July 2005 Rudston to S/edmere, August 2005 R Sledmere View, 7 & 10 August 2005 Untitled, 22 July 2005 Tree Tunnel, August 2005 The Exhibition book Author: Sir Norman Rosenthal The large scale landscape format book features a selection of archival photographs and eye-catching artworks allied to expertly written text by pre-eminent curatorial experts, art historians and critics. Compiled with the full involvement of David Hockney and his studio. Published in association with the Fondation Louis Vuitton . (Updated November 2025)

Brasserie LIPP The Random List: Au Petit Riche : Full of old world charm. A well appointed dining room with private lounges. Showing off original brass fittings (including hat racks and overhead light fixtures which were once gas lamps). A good Loire valley wine list to go with well executed traditional French food. 9th Arrondissement Metro : Opéra (Lines 3,7 and 8) Bonhomie : A contemporary Mediterranean restaurant and bar. Vibrant atmosphere and listed in the Michelin guide. 10th Arrondissement Metro : Bonne Nouvelle (Lines 8 and 9). Brasserie LIPP : An institution founded in 1880. Super traditional menu with service to match. It’s a “tick the box” choice. Frequented by writers and politicians alike, it quickly became a hub of gastronomy and intellectual life. 6th Arrondissement Metro : Saint-Germain-des-Prés (Line 4) La Coupole : Typical French brasserie in Montparnasse. Opened in 1927, it is a memorial to the French capital’s Art Deco legacy. The menu has a strong emphasis on seafood but there is one quirky dish worth trying: their famous Lamb curry. Great for groups and celebrations. 14th Arrondissement Metro: Montparnasse-Bienvenüe (Lines 4, 6, 12, and 13) Les Deux Colombes : A cosy neighbourhood gem offering authentic and delicious French cuisine. The perfect great value lunch spot near Saint Chapelle and Notre-Dame de Paris. 4th Arrondissement Metro : Cité (Line 4) Jaja : A lovely space that is a mix of historic architecture, atelier, and modernity. Great lunch spot in the Marais with an interesting wine menu near Musée National Picasso. 4th Arrondissement Metro: Saint-Paul (Line 1) and Hôtel de Ville (Lines 1 and 11) Le Perraudin : Located in the Latin Quarter. A charming, quaint, traditional French bistro. Unpretentious and good value. 5th Arrondissement RER : Luxembourg (Line B) Le Procope: Said to be the oldest Restaurant – Café – Glacier in Paris. Slightly touristy but dependable classic French menu. 6th Arrondisement Metro : Odéon (Lines 4 and 10) Roof : As it says on the tin…offering a bird’s eye view of Paris. Trendy cocktails, small eats and desserts in a lush rooftop garden setting. A great venue for a fun evening out with friends. Be prepared to queue if walking in. (Located in the Hôtel Madame Rêve). 1st Arrondissement Metro: Les Halles (Line 4) and Sentier (Line 3) Le Rosebud : Opened in 1962, and it's name? A tribute to the last word uttered by the dying protagonist in Orson Welles's Citizen Kane (1941). A gem of bar with an authentic speakeasy vibe. Dim Lighting, low key and discreet . No web page. Found here: 11 bis rue Delambre. 14th Arrondisement Metro : Edgar Quinet (Line 6) Yakuza by Olivier : Japanese + Mediterranean. A winning combination from Olivier da Costa, one of Portugal's most prestigious chefpreneurs. Definitely one for special occasions. And for spotting the the latest fashions. Think Emily in Paris ... Temporarily closed for works at the time of writing (Nov. 2025). 9th Arrondissement Metro : Opéra (Lines 3, 7, and 8) and Chaussée d'Antin - La Fayette (Lines 7 and 9) Mediterranean sushi anyone? (updated November 2025)

Sharing insights for visits to these iconic destinations: Fondation Louis Vuitton Notre-Dame de Paris Louvre Panthéon Fondation Louis Vuitton Fondation Louis Vuitton: There and back again The iconic building was designed by Canadian-American architect Frank Gehry. It is located next to the Jardin d'Acclimatation in the Bois de Boulogne, the famous park on the west side of Paris. Nearest Métro station: Les Sablons (M1). It involves a 15 minute walk initially through urban streets and then down a pleasant pathway through the Jardin d'Acclimatation. This route will pass by the restaurant within the park called La Terrasse du Jardin. As there are very few food outlets near the Fondation, this is a passable option. Nearest RER station: Avenue Foch (RER C). It involves an 18 minute walk through the trees within the Bois de Boulogne. The path could be deserted and lonely depending on the day of the week and the time of day. Opening times differ on weekdays. It opens at 10am on Saturday and Sunday but 11am on weekdays. The Fondation is closed on Tuesdays. doors do not open before the stated opening times. During popular exhibitions, there will be queues (due to security checks) even when holding a timed entry ticket. There is no shelter when queuing and limited seating. There is only 1 restaurant within the Fondation - Le Frank - and there is limited seating. Reservations (see website for details) are possible at certain times and certain days and making one is advisable. The Fondation building: 3,600 curved glass panels form the Fondation's twelve sails and 19,000 panels of Ductal (fibre-reinforced concrete). Notre-Dame de Paris: To Q or not to Q After the devastating fire in April 2019, the reconstruction of Notre-Dame de Paris (popularly known as Notre Dame) took 5 years. It reopened in December 2024 and has become the “must-see” and the “must-revisit” destination in the French capital. For some, the queues can be challenging. Long queue lines can form, snaking along the gravel frontage. There is little shelter from the elements and few seating options. Moreover, there are no publicly accessible restrooms within the cathedral. The best solution: it is possible to reserve a free timed entry ticket via the Notre-Dame de Paris website . These slots are only available a few hours before the allotted visit time. If it indicates there are no available tickets. It is advisable to keep “refreshing” the website. Slots are released throughout the day. Bonne chance! The visit is worth the effort. Snapshots of selected nooks within the refurbished Cathedral Don’t miss visiting The Treasury within the Cathedral. Entry is ticketed. To buy a ticket, visit the desk at entrance to The Treasury which is located through the south ambulatory inside the cathedral. Virgin and Child The Virgin and Child is an exceptional work of art that is a testimony to the reconstitution of the Treasury after its destruction during the French Revolution. In 1814, King Louis XVII re-established the "Vow of Louis XI" procession (Louis XIII's consecration of France to the Virgin in 1638). In 1817, a statue of the Virgin made of silver was designed with financial support from the King. It was completed during the reign of Charles X who gifted it to the Cathedral in 1826, a jubilee year. Damaged during the sacking of the archbishopric in 1831, it was not until 1856 that the canons had it restored for the baptism of the Imperial Prince, son of Napoleon III and Empress Eugénie. Since 1929, the statue has worn a crown made by the metalsmith Boucheron (see below). This Virgin and Child is still carried in procession through the streets of Paris every year on Assumption Day, the annual renewal of the vow of Marian Consecration of which Notre-Dame is the eternal memorial. (Text by Notre-Dams de Paris) Crown for the Virgin and Child Statue. Gold, lapis lazulis, translucent enamels, pearl ends, diamonds. The Rose windows: One photo is taken in 2007 and the other in 2025. Are you able to tell which is which? To find out more about them, visit the Notre-Dame de Paris website on these stained glass wonders . Metro : Cité (Line 4.) RER . Saint-Michel Notre-Dame (B, C, D) Louvre: there is more to it than the Mona Lisa Most visitors are drawn to the Denon Wing. Leonardo da Vinci's famous Mona Lisa and the Winged Victory of Samothrace are found in this wing. It is one of three in the Louvre and named after the Louvre's f irst director, Dominique Vivant Denon. Routes to and areas around these two artworks can be very busy. Oftentimes, it is almost impossible to pause awhile to appreciate the beauty of an artistic creation and allow the colours to speak directly to the soul. The Mona Lisa and everyone else! (some pixilation applied.) If time is not of the essence, then the rest of the Wing is worth exploring. Some of the galleries feature large-format works and are surprisingly uncrowded, providing ample space for quiet reflection. You will find 19th Century French paintings by by Jacques-Louis David and Eugène Delacroix. Besides da Vinci, you will also find masterpieces from Italian painters such as Raphael, and Caravaggio. There are magnificent Italian Renaissance sculptures including works by Michelangelo. Room for quiet reflection. Do not miss the Napoleon III Apartments in the Richelieu Wing. This Wing is named for French clergyman and statesman, Armand Jean du Plessis, Duke of Richelieu. He is better remembered as Cardinal Richelieu. The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas features Cardinal Richelieu as the primary antagonist, a scheming and ruthless figure who is loyal to King Louis XIII but often clashes with the Musketeers. This is a purely fictitious depiction! Napoleon III Apartments: a glimpse of the splendour of the Second Empire Useful tip: the Louvre is well-visited, and refreshments within will require patient queuing. As for available seating at it's eateries, let’s just say it’s like trying to find a long lost da Vinci in a bric and brac shop! And the wait for the Ladies (aka les toilettes pour femmes ) can be a long, long one. So plan ahead for the first and don’t leave it too late for the second. Metro: Palais Royal–Musée du Louvre (Lines 1 and 7) Louvre–Rivoli (Line 1) The Palais Royal–Musée du Louvre station is closest to the main Pyramid entrance, and there is an underground entrance that leads to the Carrousel du Louvre shopping mall and museum entrance.  The Panthéon & Anselm Kiefer The Panthéon The Panthéon, located in the Latin Quarter (5th arrondissement), was originally a church that now serves as a mausoleum for France’s most illustrious citizens, such as Victor Hugo, Voltaire, and Marie Curie. Battalion, by Anselm Keifer (2020) There is a permanent installation of works by German artist Anselm Keifer at the Panthéon in Paris. Commissioned by French President Emmanuel Macron, it is the first such commission for the Panthéon since 1924 and coincides with the 'Panthéonisation' of the French writer, poet, and WWI veteran Maurice Genevoix (1890-1980) on Armistice Day, 11 November 2020. Murals and mosaics throughout the building celebrate key moments and figures from French history. Fun fact: for scientific wizards, come and witness Foucault’s Pendulum experiment at the Panthéon. Who can resist an invitation to come and see the Earth turn? Louis Napoleon Bonaparte, fond of science and history, authorised the physicist Léon Foucault and the engineer Gustave Froment, to use the dome of the Panthéon to conduct the experiment in 1851. Fifty years later, Camille Flammarion, founder of the Astronomical Society of France, repeated the experiment at the Pantheon. The pendulum was permanently reinstalled in 1995. Metro : Cardinal Lemoine (Line 10) Place Monge (Line 7) Maubert Mutualité (Line 4) RER : Luxembourg station (Line B) (Updated November 2025)