The Pompidou Center - Parisian monster of Loch Ness

The design of the George Pompidou Center was called “Love at second sight” by National Geographic. Le Figaro (French daily newspaper) compared it to the monster of Loch Ness. The building, designed in high-tech architecture, is located quite close to Notre Dame and just next to one of the newest shopping center of Paris – Les Halles.

Inside the building, there is the National Modern Art Museum, which is actually the largest museum of modern art in Europe! On the second floor, there is also a public library where the students gather to learn together. The place is named after Georges Pompidou, the President of France in the 70s who commissioned the building. The museum was officially opened in 1977 by President Valéry Giscard d’Estaing. The Centre Pompidou has millions of visitors every year and to confirm that I must say that I always see a long queue to the entrance every time I pass by.

The view from Pompidou Center into Sacre Coeur

The Pompidou Center is known all around the world so, despite my hesitation about visiting it ( sometimes I feel like I don’t really understand modern art), I decided to go there in 2017. It was totally worth it! Even if you don’t like modern art, there is an amazing view of Paris. From one side you can see the Basilica Sacre Coeur and from the other side the Eiffel Tower.

The museum has five floors, you can access the first two floors from inside the building but for the other floors, you need to take stairs outside (don’t worry that you need to walk a lot, there are electric stairs).

I visited the exhibition of Russian modern art, you can see below pictures of some paintings and installations.

To be honest, it was difficult to understand the meaning of some installations, like a shower attached to the wall. However, like always, I enjoyed visiting a new place and especially the view from the roof of the building.

The view into Eiffel Tower from Pompidou Center

I added many pictures from this museum but I believe this is the best way of showing how the Pompidou Center looks like and find out if you would like to visit it.