Georges Pompidou Centre

The Centre Pompidou, in Paris

The Centre Pompidou is a great museum of modern and contemporary art of Paris, famous for its bold architecture. The Paris audio-guided tour stops here to evoke this singular monument of the Beaubourg district, with its colourful pipes and its external escalator.

The museum of modern art with bold architecture

The Centre Pompidou, also called Beaubourg, is one of the great museums of Paris and one of the most important of the world for modern and contemporary art. Inaugurated in 1977 on the initiative of President Georges Pompidou, it shelters the National Museum of Modern Art, with its immense collections of works of the greatest artists of the nineteenth, twentieth and twenty-first centuries, as well as a vast library and exhibition spaces. But the Centre is just as famous for its revolutionary architecture, designed by the architects Renzo Piano and Richard Rogers: the building exposes on the outside its structures, its pipes and its ducts, painted in bright colours, as well as its famous escalator housed in a glass tube on the façade, which leads to a panoramic view over Paris. Bold and emblematic, the Centre Pompidou is a major stop for lovers of art and architecture.

What to see

You admire the great museum of modern and contemporary art inaugurated in 1977, its immense collections of the greatest artists, and above all its revolutionary architecture by Renzo Piano and Richard Rogers, with structures and colourful pipes exposed on the outside and the escalator in a glass tube leading to a panoramic view over Paris. The Centre Pompidou is an emblematic monument of Paris. It is a major stop, to be explored on foot.

Practical information

The Centre Pompidou lies in the Beaubourg district, in the heart of Paris, reachable on foot and by public transport, including the metro. You admire its architecture and the square from outside; the visit of the museum and the spaces follows its own hours and conditions, which vary. It is best to check the arrangements before coming.

What is particular about the architecture of the Centre Pompidou in Paris?

Designed by Renzo Piano and Richard Rogers, it exposes on the outside the structures, pipes and ducts of the building, painted in bright colours, as well as an escalator housed in a glass tube on the façade, which leads to a panoramic view over Paris.

Where is the Centre Pompidou?

In the Beaubourg district, in the heart of Paris, in France.