The municipal museum of Paris – an alternative to traditional site-seeing Nov 30, 2009

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Paris is famous not only for its sites and tourist crowds, which often times cause many popular museums to become unavailable. As an alternative we recommend tourists to pay more attention to visiting municipal museums – these visits shouldn't take more than an hour. Meanwhile, the municipal museums are cheaper or even free, and they are almost never crowded. The collections set on display at municipal museum are usually quite impressive.

You can visit the house of Balzac free of charge. In this house the great writer has created and described over 2000 characters of his Human Comedy. Musee Galliera – The museum of Fashion – offers its visitors to view an impressive and voluminous collection of approximately 90 thousand exhibits of historical costumes, including dresses from the 17th and 19th Centuries. The ticket to the Museum of Fashion costs 7 Euros. Musee Carnavalet is held in a wonderful mansion in one of the most pleasant quarters of Paris – Marais. Under one roof it seems like the whole history of Paris has been gathered in the form of documents, art work, and photography. The entrance to the permanent exhibit halls is absolutely free.

Musee Bourdelle – the museum of Antoine Bourdelle, holds a collection of 500 sculptures and paintings of the great artist. The exhibits are placed either inside the museum halls (ex-workshops) or in the interior garden. Rodin was a big fan of Bourdelle. Nonetheless, visitors have to pay for entry to the Rodin museum, while entry to Musee Bourdelle is free. Petit Palais – the Small Palace is a free museum of fine arts. The museum holds exhibits of masters from the Middle Ages and the Renaissance period. There are also certain exhibits that date to the 19th Century. WE recommend visiting the museum garden.

Musee de la Vie Romantique – museum of romantic life can really brag a fancy collection of George Sand portraits, furniture, and jewelry. May through October there is a tea house available in the museum garden. The entry is free, but during tourist season, and when it gets crowded entry becomes 7 Euros.