The Second Phase of the Grand Palais's Reopening Is Complete—Here's What You Can Expect

Vogue

6 days ago

When Chanel returned to the Grand Palais for its runway show last October, there was the collective feeling that the house had come home after four years displaced. But the re-opening of the building's soaring, glass-ceilinged nave, timed to the Summer Olympic and Paralympic Games, marked only the first of two major phases of the Grand Palais's monumental restoration.
As of this week, the second phase is complete enough that visitors will now arrive via the main entrance on the refurbished Square Jean Perrin, where allegorical statues adorning a fountain are gleaming white. Once inside, they will behold the splendor of the building—both its original architecture and reimagined spaces—like never before.
Led by Chatillon Architectes, the project is particularly remarkable for the fact that it involved no additional building. Yet there is a vast amount of new, usable space—or, at least, space that the public is able to experience for the first time.
Beyond the entrance is a 3,000-square-meter area where people can wander freely (and for free)—one that has not existed since the building was divided into three sections in 1937. Here, luminous panels running the length of the ceiling create an almost futuristic feel amidst the circa-1900 riveted steel beams painted reseda green, a shade as signature to the Grand Palais as orange is to Hermès. There is a cafeteria on the mezzanine, a modular boutique, and seating staggered throughout—all of the fixtures and furniture realized by L'Atelier Senzu, known for its ecological approach to design.
The main attraction, however, is a view of the nave through three floor-to-ceiling windows. It is framed by an enormous curtain of nine suspended panels in gradient green, conceived under the direction of Studio MTX (one of the 12 houses within Chanel's artisanal network, Le19M) with additional decorative elements from six other ateliers. Conveniently and cleverly, the curtain will remain closed when Chanel is preparing for its shows.
The Grand Palais was onceived by a collective of architects—Henri Deglane, Louis-Albert Louvet, Albert-Félix-Théophile Thomas, and Charles Giraud—as a stage for French patrimony and culture when Paris hosted the Universal Exhibition in 1900. It also encompassed the Palais d'Antin, which later became the Palais de la découverte, a kind of science discovery museum that remained open, albeit tired, until the renovations began in 2021.