Élysée Palace
France's president actually works and sleeps here — a functioning palace, not a museum.
Coming soon on iOS — be first to walk Paris offline.
This is where France is governed: the Council of Ministers meets here every week, presided over by the president, who lives upstairs in first-floor private apartments. The official presidential residence since 1848, it holds rooms like the Salon d'Argent, where Napoleon signed his abdication on 22 June 1815. As a working residence, you take it in from the street.
What to look for
- The four-Ionic-column entrance gate on Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré, opening onto the rounded ceremonial courtyard
- The gilded Salon Doré, the main study of every president except Giscard d'Estaing and Macron
- The Salle des Fêtes ceiling — Guillaume Dubufe's 1894 painting 'La République sauvegarde la Paix', above six Gobelins tapestries
At 55 Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré (8th arrondissement) — a working presidential residence and meeting place of the Council of Ministers, so view it from the street.
Élysée Palace is one of 33 sights worth the detour in Paris, all bundled offline in Voyage GO — download the Paris pack and it sits on your map with no signal, filling your travel passport the moment you walk past.
More to see in Paris
- Eiffel TowerThe 300-metre iron tower Parisian artists petitioned against before it was even finished.
- Louvre MuseumThe world's most-visited museum lives inside a 12th-century fortress that became a royal palace.
- Notre-Dame de ParisThe spire fell on live TV in April 2019; since December 2024 you can walk back inside.
- Musée d'OrsayVan Gogh and Monet hung inside a Beaux-Arts station built for the Paris–Orléans railway.
- Champs-ÉlyséesA single 1.9-km straight line runs from the Concorde obelisk to the Arc de Triomphe — Paris's ceremonial spine on the Axe historique.
- Place de la BastilleThe prison that lit a revolution is gone — and the mob that stormed it on 14 July 1789 came for gunpowder, not the seven forgotten men inside.