How Paris Became Paris

 

While Baron Haussmann is usually considered the architect of today’s Paris, DeJean goes back a few hundred years earlier. In this engrossing new book, she notes that the first full design for the French capital was actually implemented in the 17th century, which saw the advent of boulevards, public parks and bridges. The addition of street lighting, theaters and appealing shops—not to mention some of the earliest sidewalks—helped make Paris the first modern city. .