Les Halles

Les Halles Review

For 801 years, this is the district that fed Paris, with acres of food halls overflowing with meats, fish, and vegetables. Sensuously described in Émile Zola's novel The Belly of Paris, Les Halles was teeming with life—though not all of it good: hucksters and homeless shared these streets with prostitutes (who still ply their trade—though in diminishing numbers—on nearby Rue St-Denis). And the plague of cat-size rats didn't cease until the market moved to the suburbs in 1969. Today, you can still see stuffed pests hanging by their tails in the windows of the circa-1872 shop Julien Aurouze (8 rue des Halles) whose sign, Destruction des Animaux Nuisibles (in other words, vermin extermination), says it all. All that remains of the 19th-century iron-and-glass market buildings, designed by architect Victor Baltard, is a portion of the superstructure on the southern edge of the Jardins des Halles, which was turned into an unattractive plaza and garden. The Fontaine des Innocents, sculpted in 1550, at rues Berger and Pierre Lescot, marks the site of what was once a vast cemetery before the bones were moved to the Catacombs. After years of delays, Les Halles is undergoing one of the city's most ambitious public works projects: A sweeping €500 million renovation that will transform the plaza, and the much-maligned underground concrete mall the Forum des Halles, into a place where Parisians actually want to go. In an echo of the past, a 48-foot vast iron-and-glass canopy will cover a sweeping garden and plaza, flooding light into the stores below. While the project has not been without opponents, most Parisians are happy about the prospect of a prettier Les Halles, even if they have to wait until 2016 to see it. The plaza is closed during construction, though the mall will remain open, with partial closures. Looming over the construction site is the magnificent church of St-Eustache, a Gothic gem. Film buffs may want to check out the recently renovated Forum des Images, with some 7,000 films available for viewing on individual screens. To find it, enter the mall on the side of the church at the Porte St-Eustache.

The streets surrounding Les Halles have boomed in recent years with boutiques, bars, and restaurants galore that have sent rents skyrocketing. Historic rue Montorgueil, is home to small food shops and cafés. Running parallel, rue Montmartre, near the church, still has specialty shops selling foie gras and other delicacies, though these merchants, like the butchers and bakers before them, are slowly being pushed out by trendy clothing boutiques.