Musée du Louvre

Palais du Louvre

Jacques Lemercier (French architect, ca.1584-1654)

Louis Le Vau (French architect, 1612-1670)

Pierre Lescot (French architect, born ca. 1500-1510, died 1578)

Paris, Île-de-France, France

France

1546-1878 (creation)

Lemercier's additions to the Louvre, elevations

The building of the Louvre in its present form was begun in 1546 by François I, who also founded the royal collections, acquiring works by Leonardo, Raphael, and Titian. The modern Palais du Louvre comprises a square courtyard, the Cour Carrée, to the west of which project two wings. The north wing, the Galerie Napoléon, runs along the Rue de Rivoli, while the south wing, the Galerie du Bord de l'Eau, fronts the River Seine. After 1639, Jacques Le Mercier doubled the size of the west wing and added the enormous Pavillon de l'Horloge with cumbersome decorations. In April 1667 Colbert commissioned designs for the east façade from a committee that included Louis Le Vau, Charles Le Brun and Claude Perrault. The Cour Carrée was completed under the First Empire, between 1801 and 1810. The grand design was completed under Napoleon III, who decreed on 12 March 1852 that the Louvre should be completed within five years. Louis Tullius Joachim Visconti and later Hector-Martin Lefuel constructed two parallel buildings, on either side of the Cour du Carrousel.

line drawings (drawings)

Architectural Documentation

art museums

museums

exhibition buildings

elevations

Empire

Mannerist (Renaissance-Baroque style)

French

architectural exteriors

architectural interiors

rulers and leaders

Art museums

Francis I, King of France, 1494-1547

Blomfield Reginald Theodore, Sir. A History of French Architecture from the reign of Charles VIII till the death of Mazarin. London: G. Bell and sons, ltd., 1921, XXXIV.

Public Domain

Lemercier, Jacques