Reusable Palaces

France has a rich and vibrant history that is preserved well because it has been actively saving buildings and structures since the 1700s. France’s history has included powerful monarchies with some substantial turmoil and revolutions that ended any monarchy, even a figure head one like in England. So what happens to all the grand places the French monarchs built and lived in when there is no more monarchy? It becomes property of the French government and they’ve chosen to reuse these palaces for public use and make a profit at the same time.

On this trip we’ve been to several places that have been reused from their original purpose. This is called adaptive reuse which means… this is seen clearly at Versailles, which was built as a representation of the kings wealth and power. This enormous gilded palace was once home to the most powerful people in France. They built it through generations of kings and put extensive gardens on the property. At the time this showed off the monarchy’s power and wealth to anyone who saw it. Today it’s a little bit different. The palace is still as gilded as ever but it is now open to the public and a huge tourist attraction. The same place where the royals slept and danced and played cards in are now seen by thousands everyday as a museum that shows off the extensive artwork and amazing furniture in the palace. The gardens are seen by even more people everyday and are now the home of family picnics, row boats and restaurants.

The louvre is also an example of adaptive reuse. It was also once home to the French royalty when they were in Paris. It is now probably more famous for its priceless artwork though. Walking through the louvre I was listening to all the facts about the art on the walls but I was really looking at the ceilings, columns and other little details about the old palace itself. Being in the same room where kings and queens were married with priceless artwork on the walls was an overwhelming experience.
I loved how these places used to be home to the most powerful and elite people in France and now they are open to the public. This allows for anyone to be able to appreciate the art there now but also to feel apart of the rich history that each of those reused palaces holds.

After visiting Disneyland Paris during their 25th anniversary, I wanted to find out more about the history of the park. The park was the second Disney theme park to open outside of the United States, the first being a park in Tokyo. There are two parks apart of the complex. Disneyland Park was the first of them to open in 1992, and Walt Disney Studios opened in 2002. After the success of the Tokyo park, plans to make a park in Europe emerged. There was a list of 1,200 European cities to place the potential park in 1984. Within a year, the list was narrowed down to 4 cities, two in France and two in Spain. Both Spanish sites were located near the Mediterranean and offered a subtropical climate similar to Disney’s parks in California and Florida. Disney had also shown interest in a site near Toulon in southern France. However, shallow bedrock was encountered beneath the site, which would have rendered construction too difficult. Finally, a site in the rural town of Marne-la-Vallée was chosen because of its proximity to Paris and its central location in Western Europe. This location was estimated to be no more than a four hour drive for 68 million people and no more than a two hour flight for a further 300 million. During the first few years of the park being opened, attendance was much lower than expected. In 1995, there was a financial turn around with the opening of the park’s new attraction, Space Mountain. In one year the theme park’s attendance had climbed from 8.8 million to 10.7 million. In less than 15 years, Disneyland Paris had become the number one tourist destination for Europe, outselling the Louvre and the Eiffel Tower. I’m so glad I got to visit Disneyland Paris, it was one of my favorite days of the whole month and I had so much fun!