The Permanent Collection
THE MUSÉE DES ARTS DÉCORATIFS
DISCOVERING THE MUSEUM
Discovering the Musée des Arts Décoratifs
This tour presents the principal period rooms (reconstructions of furnished rooms decorated in a particular historical style,) as well as a selection of emblematic pieces from the permanent collections, leading visitors to discover the French way of life from the Middle Ages through the 20th Century.
Guided Tour
A History of Jewellery from the 18th Century to Today
An essential element of a person’s attire, jewellery is a true marker of its historical period. This tour revisits the history of jewellery, combining a chronological approach with an understanding of technical evolutions in jewellery-making. Rings, bracelets, brooches… the Jewellery Gallery offers an exceptional panorama of historical and contemporary pieces.
Guided Tour
Treasures from the Musée des Arts Décoratifs
If the Musée des Arts Décoratifs is the museum of the Object, this tour reveals its finest masterpieces. From the Middle Ages to the present day, the visit is punctuated by the discovery of exceptional pieces. Rivaling each other in technical prowess and inventiveness, they illustrate the skills of artists and craftsmen, as well as the museum’s motto: “The beautiful in the useful”!
Guided Tour
French Savoir-Faire and Luxury
Present throughout history in a variety of forms, the notion of luxury is incarnated in a diverse range of periods and places. In the West, the notion of luxury is indistinguishable from notions of rarity, preciousness, and excellence. It is at the centre of this tour that spans from the Middle Ages through the 20Th Century.
Guided Tour
Artist, Artisan, Designer
Artisans, decorators, designers, and other decorative artists… the men and women who created the pieces on display in the museum’s collection often wore several hats at once. From the Middle Ages to the present day, this tour retraces the entire history of the decorative arts, and the museum that honors them, through the prism of the organization and evolution of the trades.
Guided Tour
In the Company of the Marquise Arconati Visconti
Follow the story of the Marquise Arconati Visconti, a benefactor of the arts with extraordinary liberty and an exceptional destiny. In this theatrical tour, you will discover the magnificent pieces she donated to the museum: paintings, sculptures, furniture, objets d’art, as well as jewellery and ceramics. This prestigious collection illustrates the Marquise’s great passion for the decorative arts from the Middle Ages, Renaissance and 18th and 19th Centuries, as well as her interest in Asian and Islamic arts.
Dramatized guided tour
Four themes are proposed to discover the permanent collections of the museum:
- A PERIOD, A WAY OF LIFE
- SHAPES AND USES
- MATERIALS AND TECHNIQUES
- INTERIOR DESIGN AND SOURCES OF INSPIRATION
Activities are offered around each of these themes.
A PERIOD, A WAY OF LIFE
Discover how different objects reflect the cultural codes and way of life of a given historical period.
Château Living, From the Middle Ages to the 17th Century
Many of the pieces in the permanent collection testify to the evolution of society between the Middle Ages and the 17th Century. Tapestries, furniture, table settings, and other objects become increasingly varied and refined in response to an increasing desire for luxury and focus on outward appearances. Visitors will also learn how the discovery of Antiquity and the influence of Italy let to a rebirth of classicism in the “Grand Siècle.”
Guided Tour
Salon Living, the 18th Century
Following the great pomp of Louis the 14th’s reign, there was a renewed taste for intimate comfort. In the 18th Century, the French art de vivre became a model imitated throughout Europe. This tour presents a wide diversity of furnishings that illustrate the period’s refined taste in objects and décor. Spanning from the Regency period through reign of Louis the 16th, the guide evokes the Enlightenment and the evolution in taste: from “rocaille” to a return to Antiquity for inspiration, from chinoiserie to Anlgo-mania.
Guided Tour
At the Time of Expositions Universelles, the 19th Century
From the grandiosity of Napoleon’s empire, to the eclectic historicism of a society inspired by the past and by the world at large, this tour presents the evolution in taste over the course of a century particularly rich in political, industrial, social and aesthetic revolutions. By looking at masterpieces from the Universal Exhibitions, the visit also shows how artisans tirelessly sought to reinvent themselves in the face of industrialization.
Guided Tour
Toward Modernity: Art Nouveau
From the late 19th Century to the Belle Epoque, this tour proposes to rediscover the museum’s Art Nouveau collection. The Art Nouveau movement reunited all the decorative arts in its quest for a “total art” that sought inspiration in movement, nature, and Japanese culture. From Émile Gallé to Hector Guimard, from Louis Majorelle to Eugène Graset, the aesthetic experience of this tour is also an invitation to identify the beginnings of modernity.
Guided Tour
Hector Guimard’s Art Nouveau
The museum is initiating a series of visits dedicated to emblematic designers of the Decorative Arts, and to celebrate the year of the famous designer, we’re starting with Hector Guimard. Come and discover or rediscover one of the most representative artists of the Art Nouveau period, as well as one of the most creative and prolific. An architect, decorator and furniture designer, he drew his inspiration from the curves of nature, which invaded objects and settings in homes and cities alike.
Guided Tour
Adventures in Industrial Design: the 20th and 21st Centuries
Spanning from the 1940s to the present, this tour is an invitation to discover the precursors of industrial design (Le Corbusier, Charlotte Perriand, Jean Prouvé…) as well as contemporary artists such as Benjamin Grandorge, Alvaro Catalan de Ocon, Fanette Mellier…From post-war concerns to our current preoccupation with tech and the environment, this tour retraces the great social questions of the second half of the 20th Century and the first half of the 21st.
Guided Tour
FORM AND FUNCTION
These tours examine the function of pieces in the collection and retrace the evolution of how we’ve used them over the centuries.
Sitting
On this tour, visitors discover the incredible diversity of seats that have been invented over the course of human history. To relax, work, or talk, there are a thousand and one ways to sit down. Benches, chairs, beanbags and sofas are just a few of the technical solutions furniture makers and designers have proposed to bring us greater comfort as our ways of living and clothing choices continue to evolve.
Guided Tour
Eating
Emblematic both to the museum’s collections and French culture, the art of dressing the table is at the centre of this tour, which follows the evolution of habits and mores surrounding how we eat. From glasses to forks, services to centrepieces, the wide variety of shapes, colours and patterns of the pieces on display are discussed, shining light on both their functionality and their fabrication.
Guided Tour
Lighting
From candles to electricity this chronological tour presents the history of light fixtures over the centuries. Candelabras, chandeliers, wall sconces… The inventiveness of designers seeking to light the home is discussed in connection with technical evolutions and the properties of the materials used in lighting fixtures. Direct or shaded? The question of how we use light is discussed in association with more general principles of interior design.
Guided Tour
MATERIALS AND TECHNIQUES
Wood, glass, earth, metal, and stone. Develop a deeper understanding of the collections by discovering the materials and the techniques, tools and trades, past and present, that shaped them.
Working with Wood: Joiners and Cabinet Makers
Solid, painted, sculpted, or gilded, wood is a material that is particularly present in the museum’s collections. It is the central element of the furniture and design elements shown on this tour that spans from the Middle Ages to the Art Nouveau period. Samples and tools complement the visit, bringing a greater understanding of the gilders and joiners’ trades.
Guided Exploration
Working with Glass: Glassmakers
True magicians, glassmakers transform sand into glass using the alchemy of air and fire. Precious Murano glass, romantic opaline, recent vases made from molten glass, this itinerary invites the visitor to retrace the history of glass. It reveals both the great technical prowess of glass artisans and the creativity of contemporary artists.
Guided Exploration
Working with Metal: Silversmiths and Jewellers
Rings, bracelets, and necklaces take shape in the hands of the jeweller, a trade that demands infinite finesse, and endless creativity as it requires working with precious metals and other materials. Silver and goldsmiths are artists who work with gold, silver and enamel. Jewellery and other objects are engraved, chiselled, stamped... This itinerary through the museum’s Jewellery Gallery uncovers their secrets.
Guided Exploration
Working with Earth: Ceramicists
Since the beginning of time, ceramicists have mastered the art of transforming earth into objects. Stoneware, earthenware, soft and hard-paste porcelain, barbotine… this itinerary leads the visitor through the extraordinary variety of ceramic shapes and techniques that were born between the 15th and 21st Centuries.
Guided Exploration
Working with Stone: Marblers
Since Antiquity, marble has been used in sculpture and architecture, and the material is ubiquitous in the collections of the Musée des Arts Décoratifs. Extremely resistant, marble is a choice material for floors and walls, but also for protecting furniture. This itinerary leads the visitor on a journey from the Renaissance to the present day, in which the incredible diversity of marble, and its surprising range of colours, is on full display.
Guided Exploration
SOURCES OF INSPIRATION
Decode the vocabulary and the diverse sources of inspiration to enrich your understanding of a period, theme, or artistic movement.
Geometry and the Decorative Arts
This tour shows the major role geometry has played in the history of the decorative arts. Whether inspired by principles of Classical architecture, or in search of a certain simplicity, elementary shapes are found in objects from the 16th Century to the present day. The visit focuses on the patterns, shapes, and geometric lines that give shape to both objects and entire styles of interior design.
Guided Tour
Nature and the Decorative Arts
Rose, iris, acanthus, and palm. Flowers and leaves are found throughout the museum’s collections. An untiring source of inspiration for artists, nature offers a marvellous repertory of shapes and colours that are renewed and updated in each successive era. Represented naturalistically, or highly stylized, sculpted, or as an element of interior design, the natural world is the focus of this tour that leads visitors from the Middle Ages to the Art Nouveau period.
Guided Tour
Go over the wall, a History of Decor
Covered in wood, sculpted, gilded, decorated with wallpaper or fabric, the walls of our living spaces are emblematic of the periods represented at the museum, from the Middle Ages to the 20th Century. They are also an invitation to transport us elsewhere. Like windows that open to the exterior, exotic patterns carved into wood, and flowered or panoramic wallpaper, illustrated with historical scenes, invite us to travel while never leaving home.
Guided Tour
Red
Blood, fire, danger, love, glory, beauty… The colour red is rich in significance and symbolism. It is also the first colour that human beings created, mastered, and could reproduce in different tones. This guided tour is an invitation to discover the flamboyant history of the colour red through a presentation of diverse objects dating from the Middle Ages to the 20th Century.
Guided Tour
Blue
Sky blue, royal blue, navy blue… Today blue is Europeans’ favourite colour. Though the secret to making indigo was mastered in the neolithic period, it wasn’t until the 12th Century that blue became widely used as a colour. What changed? This tour proposes to follow a trail of clues to uncover the sumptuous history of the use of blue in the decorative arts.
Guided Tour
Black
It symbolizes the dark side, mourning, but also elegance and modernity. Black expresses strong feelings and stark contrast. It is commonly used in opposition to white, and both “colours” share the status of not being considered a colour at all. Since when? Why? And today? From the Middle Ages to the present day, this tour follows the trail of black across the museum’s collections.
Guided Tour
MUSÉE NISSIM DE CAMONDO
The Musée Nissim de Camondo is closed for works and will reopen at the beginning of 2026.