Between 1900 and 1913, Hector Guimard was responsible for the first generation of entrances to the underground stations of the

Paris Métro The Paris Métro (french: Métro de Paris ; short for Métropolitain ) is a rapid transit system in the Paris metropolitan area, France. A symbol of the Paris, city, it is known for its density within the capital's territorial limits, uniform ar ...

. His

Art Nouveau Art Nouveau (; ) is an international style of art, architecture, and applied art, especially the decorative arts. The style is known by different names in different languages: in German, in Italian, in Catalan, and also known as the Modern ...

designs in

cast iron Cast iron is a class of iron–carbon alloys with a carbon content more than 2%. Its usefulness derives from its relatively low melting temperature. The alloy constituents affect its color when fractured: white cast iron has carbide impuriti ...

and glass dating mostly to 1900, and the associated lettering that he also designed, created what became known as the Métro style (''style Métro'') and popularized Art Nouveau. However, arbiters of style were scandalized and the public was also less enamored of his more elaborate entrances. In 1904 his design for the

Opéra This is a glossary list of opera genres, giving alternative names. "Opera" is an Italian word (short for "opera in musica"); it was not at first ''commonly'' used in Italy (or in other countries) to refer to the genre of particular works. Most c ...

station at

Place de l'Opéra The Place de l'Opéra is a square in the 9th arrondissement of Paris, at the junction of the Boulevard des Italiens, Boulevard des Capucines, Avenue de l'Opéra, , , Rue de la Paix and . It was built at the same time as the Opéra Garnier (desig ...

was rejected and his association with the Métro ended; many of his station entrances have been demolished, including all three of the pavilion type (at

Bastille The Bastille (, ) was a fortress in Paris, known formally as the Bastille Saint-Antoine. It played an important role in the internal conflicts of France and for most of its history was used as a state prison by the kings of France. It was sto ...

and on

Avenue de Wagram Avenue de Wagram is a street in the 8th and 17th arrondissements of Paris, extending from the Place de Wagram to the Place Charles de Gaulle (formerly ''Place de l'Étoile'', and the site of the Arc de Triomphe). It is long and wide, and is ...

at Étoile). Those that remain are now all protected historical monuments, one has been reconstituted, and some originals and replicas also survive outside France.

Construction and characteristics

Place du Palais-Royal et Grands Magasins du Louvre CPA

The initial network of the Paris Métropolitain (soon commonly abbreviated to "Métro") was planned and built at one time in order to minimize disruption to the city from on-going construction and to open Line 1 and two branches in time for the Exposition Universelle in 1900. A design competition was held for the above-ground components, to alleviate the public's fear that they would mar the cityscape with an industrial appearance. The new entrances were stipulated to be "as elegant as possible but above all very light, prioritising iron, glass and ceramic". However, the submitted entries were all too bulky for many of the sidewalk sites.''Hector Guimard'': Photographs by Felipe Ferré, Text by

Maurice Rheims Maurice Rheims (4 January 1910 – 6 March 2003) was a French art auctioneer, art historian and novelist, born in Versailles. He administered the estate of the painter Pablo Picasso Pablo Ruiz Picasso (25 October 1881 – 8 April 1973) ...

, Explanatory Captions and Chronology by Georges Vigne. 1985; English ed. trans. Robert Erich Wolf, New York: Abrams, 1988, , p. 88. Adrien Bénard, the financier whose bank was underwriting the construction, liked the new Art Nouveau style and therefore instead persuaded the

Compagnie du chemin de fer métropolitain de Paris The Compagnie du chemin de fer métropolitain de Paris S.A. (Paris Metropolitan Railway Company Ltd.), or CMP, was the forerunner of the RATP, the company managing the Paris Métro. Origin So as not to be dependent on the Chemin de fer de l ...

(CMP) to appoint the still young Hector Guimard to design the entrances to the underground stations,

Laurence des Cars Laurence des Cars (born Laurence Élisabeth de Pérusse des Cars on 13 June 1966) is a French general curator of heritage and art historian, since September 2021 Director of the Louvre Museum after having headed the Musée d'Orsay and Musée de ...

, "Fin de Siècle. Art Nouveau: The Rejection of Imitation: The architect and the city: Hector Guimard in Paris", in and Laurence des Cars, ed.

Henri Loyrette Henri Loyrette (born 31 May 1952 in Neuilly-sur-Seine, a suburb of Paris) was the chairman of Admical, a French organisation dedicated to corporate philanthropy., and the former director of the Louvre Museum (2001–2013). He became first curato ...

, ''Nineteenth Century French Art''. 2006, English ed. trans. David Radzinowicz, Paris: Flammarion, 2007, , pp. 432–37, p. 436. while the elevated stations were designed by

Jean-Camille Formigé Jean-Camille Formigé (1845-1926) was a French architect during the French Third Republic.green emulating weathered brass."An Entrance to the Paris Métropolitain: conservation of an original Hector Guimard architectural surround"
Conservation,

National Gallery of Art The National Gallery of Art, and its attached Sculpture Garden, is a national art museum in Washington, D.C., United States, located on the National Mall, between 3rd and 9th Streets, at Constitution Avenue NW. Open to the public and free of char ...

, retrieved April 10, 2018. (For a renovation that began in 1999, the RATP, the Paris transportation authority, restored the entrances to two slightly different shades: at sites with a lot of vegetation, ''vert wagon'' ('train-car green'), the dark green used for Parisian public works at the turn of the 20th century, and at fully urban sites, a slightly bluer shade, ''vert allemand'' ('German green'). RATP press release
"Rénovation des entrées du métro"
at ''L'Art Nouveau.com'' .) He designed standardized components, including railing cartouches incorporating the letter "M" and signs in his own distinctive lettering reading "Métropolitain" or, at narrow entrances, "Métro"; later the use of the lettering was extended to a holder for a system map and for advertising (''porte-plan'') with the station name above. In addition to speed (the first set of entrances were installed within six months of their design) and relatively low cost in manufacture and adaptation to different sizes and locations of entrances, all of this gave the system a stylistic identity.Ovenden, p. 25. Three of the entrances took the form of free-standing pavilions or small stations, including waiting rooms: one at

and two on

at Étoile. These were in a style influenced by Japanese pagodas. At Étoile Guimard provided exterior doors for elevators, although the elevators were not built. Eight simpler but still elaborate structures, labeled "Édicule B" by Guimard, were installed at the termini of Line 1 as originally opened and at two other major stations. These consisted of three-sided glass-roofed structures enclosing the stairway, with a projecting canopy.Rheims and Vigne, pp. 88–89. A variation on this format, "Édicule A", lacked the canopy and was erected at two stations, Saint-Paul and Reuilly – Diderot. These ''édicule'' types of entrance, which have come to be called ''libellules'' because they resemble

dragonflies A dragonfly is a flying insect belonging to the infraorder Anisoptera below the order Odonata. About 3,000 extant species of true dragonfly are known. Most are tropical, with fewer species in temperate regions. Loss of wetland habitat threa ...

, in some cases had decorated wall panels surfaced in reconstituted

lava Lava is molten or partially molten rock (magma) that has been expelled from the interior of a terrestrial planet (such as Earth) or a moon onto its surface. Lava may be erupted at a volcano or through a fracture in the crust, on land or un ...

. The great majority of the entrances built (154) were unroofed enclosures, dubbed an ''entourage''. A transitional form between the ''entourage'' and the ''édicule'', railings with a roof and canopy, was used for one entrance at the

Gare de Lyon The Gare de Lyon, officially Paris-Gare-de-Lyon, is one of the six large mainline railway stations in Paris, France. It handles about 148.1 million passengers annually according to the estimates of the SNCF in 2018, with SNCF railways and RER D ...

métro station. At many of the ''entourages'', the top of the steps is surmounted by a "Métropolitain" or "Métro" sign in a holder that extends between two risers in the form of sinuous stalks, traditionally compared to

lily-of-the-valley Lily of the valley (''Convallaria majalis'' (), sometimes written lily-of-the-valley, is a woodland flowering plant with sweetly scented, pendent, bell-shaped white flowers borne in sprays in spring. It is native throughout the cool temperate No ...

, each bearing a light in the form of a red-orange globe reminiscent of an eye or a flower."Hector Guimard, French, 1867–1942: Entrance Gate to Paris Subway (''Métropolitain'') Station, c. 1900"
''MoMA Highlights: 350 Works from the Museum of Modern Art, New York'', ed. Harriet Schoenholz Bee and Cassandra Heliczer, New York:

Museum of Modern Art The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. It plays a major role in developing and collecting modern art, and is often identified as one of ...

, 2nd ed., 2004, , p. 39. These were not ready until 1901, the year after the system first opened, and Guimard varied the "Métropolitain" lettering somewhat between stations and twice revised the design, which reached its final form in 1902. File:Paris Métro Quatre-Septembre 906.jpg, Railing escutcheon with "M", Quatre-Septembre File:Metro tuileries21.jpg, Hollow cartouche,

Tuileries The Tuileries Palace (french: Palais des Tuileries, ) was a royal and imperial palace in Paris which stood on the right bank of the River Seine, directly in front of the Louvre. It was the usual Parisian residence of most French monarchs, from ...

File:Anvers metro station, Paris 7 April 2014 003.jpg, Lamps and "Métropolitain" sign, Anvers File:Colonnette de la bouche de métro Place d'Italie côté avenue d'Italie.JPG, Corner post on simple enclosure, Place d'Italie File:Metro de Paris detail entree Guimard.jpg, Close-up of entrance lamp File:A7-01423.jpg, Design on wall panel of ''édicule'',

Porte Dauphine Porte may refer to: *Sublime Porte, the central government of the Ottoman empire * Porte, Piedmont, a municipality in the Piedmont region of Italy *John Cyril Porte, British/Irish aviator *Richie Porte Richard Julian Porte (born 30 January 198 ...

Reception and later history

The Guimard entrances received a generally warm reception.

Salvador Dalí Salvador Domingo Felipe Jacinto Dalí i Domènech, Marquess of Dalí of Púbol (; ; ; 11 May 190423 January 1989) was a Spanish Surrealism, surrealist artist renowned for his technical skill, precise draftsmanship, and the striking and bizarr ...

later called them "those divine entrances to the Métro, by grace of which one can descend into the region of the subconscious of the living and monarchical aesthetic of tomorrow". By way of what became known as ''le style Métro'', they popularized Art Nouveau, which had been a style known largely to connoisseurs of the avant garde.F. Lanier Graham, ''Hector Guimard'', Exhibition Catalog, New York: Museum of Modern Art, 1970, , p. 14. However, critics and many of the public were hostile to the ''libellules'' in particular, and criticized the green as "German" and the lettering as "un-French" and, according to critic André Hallays in ''Le Temps'', "confus ng tolittle children who are trying to learn their letters and ... stupefy ng toforeigners". On the

Champs-Élysées The Avenue des Champs-Élysées (, ; ) is an avenue in the 8th arrondissement of Paris, France, long and wide, running between the Place de la Concorde in the east and the Place Charles de Gaulle in the west, where the Arc de Triomphe is lo ...

, for example at Marbeuf (now part of

Franklin D. Roosevelt Franklin Delano Roosevelt (; ; January 30, 1882April 12, 1945), often referred to by his initials FDR, was an American politician and attorney who served as the 32nd president of the United States from 1933 until his death in 1945. As the ...

), simple stone walls with discreet carved signage were used instead, and a plain design was also used at Bourse.Ovenden, p. 28.Ovenden, p. 30. Unhappiness with Guimard's 1904 design for the

station, described in ''

Le Figaro ''Le Figaro'' () is a French daily morning newspaper founded in 1826. It is headquartered on Boulevard Haussmann in the 9th arrondissement of Paris. The oldest national newspaper in France, ''Le Figaro'' is one of three French newspapers of reco ...

'' as having "contorted ramps" and "enormous frog-eye lamps",Naylor, p. 20. and increasing costs led to the CMP severing its relationship with him. The entrance at Opéra was instead designed by , in classical marble. The CMP bought Guimard's molds and rights and a total of 141 of his entrances were ultimately produced, the last in 1913. The CMP continued in later years to replace some of Guimard's designs with more sober entrances by Cassien-Bernard, often a plain balustrade in white stone, for example at

Gare de l'Est The Gare de l'Est (; English: "Station of the East" or "East station"), officially Paris-Est, is one of the six large mainline railway station termini in Paris, France. It is located in the 10th arrondissement, not far southeast from the Gar ...

, Madeleine,

Montparnasse Montparnasse () is an area in the south of Paris, France, on the left bank of the river Seine, centred at the crossroads of the Boulevard du Montparnasse and the Rue de Rennes, between the Rue de Rennes and boulevard Raspail. Montparnasse has bee ...

, and Saint-François-Xavier. Modernization beginning after World War I also led to the demolition of many, especially the more elaborate. Shortly before World War II, it was suggested that those remaining should be scrapped for their metal. Art Nouveau had only briefly been in fashion and only became popular once more in the last quarter of the 20th century.

Entrances extant today

Ninety-one Guimard entrances survived until 1970. Eighty-six are still extant and protected as historical monuments; six were protected in 1965, the remainder in 1978. These include two original Type B ''édicules'': at

, on its original site and with the wall panels, and at Abbesses (moved from Hôtel de Ville in 1974). A third Type B of varying form at Châtelet is a 2000 recreation. The remainder of the preserved entrances are simple enclosures or ''entourages'', with or without the light and sign arch. In addition, two sides of an ''entourage'' form an entryway to the headquarters building of the RATP. File:Metro station entrance (édicule Guimard) Porte Dauphine Paris 16e 002.jpg, Original entrance at

File:Abbesses entrance 2.jpg, Entrance at Abbesses, originally at Hôtel de Ville File:Entrée Métro Châtelet place Ste Opportune Paris 4.jpg, Recreated entrance at Châtelet File:Paris - Maison de la RATP 02.jpg, Entrance to RATP headquarters

Surviving Guimard entrances in Paris protected as historical monuments

Guimard entrances elsewhere

Some subway systems and museums outside France have examples of Guimard Métro entrances, mostly replicas presented by the RATP in exchange for art works. * '' Entourage Guimard'': Square-Victoria-OACI station on the

Montreal Metro The Montreal Metro (french: Métro de Montréal) is a rubber-tired underground rapid transit system serving Greater Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The metro, operated by the Société de transport de Montréal (STM), was inaugurated on October 14, ...

in Canada has a genuine Guimard entrance made from parts of demolished Paris entrances (with map holder and "Métropolitain" sign and holder reproduced from the original molds). It was installed in 1967. During restoration in 2001–2002, it was found to have the last examples of the original glass light globes, which in Paris had been replaced with plastic for safety; one was returned to the RATP and the other placed on display in the

Montreal Museum of Fine Arts The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts (MMFA; french: Musée des beaux-arts de Montréal, MBAM) is an art museum in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. It is the largest art museum in Canada by gallery space. The museum is located on the historic Golden Square ...

. * Bellas Artes station on the

Mexico City Metro The Mexico City Metro ( es, Metro de la Ciudad de México) is a rapid transit system that serves the metropolitan area of Mexico City, including some municipalities in Mexico State. Operated by the Sistema de Transporte Colectivo (STC), it is ...

in Mexico has a Guimard entrance installed in 1998. * Picoas station on the

Lisbon Metro The Lisbon Metro ( pt, Metropolitano de Lisboa) is the rapid transit system in Lisbon, Portugal. Opened in December 1959, it was the first metro system in Portugal. , the system's four lines total of route and serve 56 stations. History In ...

in Portugal has a Guimard entrance installed in 1995. * Kievskaya station on the

Moscow Metro The Moscow Metro) is a metro system serving the Russian capital of Moscow as well as the neighbouring cities of Krasnogorsk, Reutov, Lyubertsy and Kotelniki in Moscow Oblast. Opened in 1935 with one line and 13 stations, it was the first unde ...

in Russia has a Guimard entrance installed in 2007. *

Van Buren Street station Van Buren Street station is a commuter rail station in downtown Chicago that serves the Metra Electric Line to University Park, Illinois, University Park, Blue Island, Illinois, Blue Island, and South Chicago, Chicago, South Chicago neighborhood; ...

on the Metra Electric Line in Chicago had a Guimard entrance installed in 2001. * '' An Entrance to the Paris Métropolitain'': The

in Washington, D.C., United States has a Guimard entrance in its

sculpture garden A sculpture garden or sculpture park is an outdoor garden or park which includes the presentation of sculpture, usually several permanently sited works in durable materials in landscaped surroundings. A sculpture garden may be private, owned by ...

, first shown at the gallery in a 2000–2001 exhibition on Art Nouveau and permanently installed in the garden in 2003. * The

in New York City, United States has the archway consisting of the light stalks and "Métropolitain" sign from the Guimard entrance to Raspail station. * The Dali Theater Museum in

Figueres Figueres (, ; , es, Figueras, ) is the capital of the ''comarca'' of Alt Empordà, in the province of Girona, Catalonia, Spain. The town is the birthplace of artist Salvador Dalí, and houses the Teatre-Museu Gala Salvador Dalí, a large museu ...

(Girona, Spain) has a pair of the light stalks from a Guimard Métro entrance, which are exhibited on the patio."Streetlights from the Paris Metro, design by Hector Guimard"
Dalí Theatre and Museum, retrieved February 9, 2021. File:GuimardMon.JPG, Square-Victoria-OACI, Montreal File:Die U-Bahnstation von Bellas Artes.jpg, Bellas Artes, Mexico City File:Picoas entrance.jpg, Picoas, Lisbon File:Kievskaya-entry.jpg, Kievskaya, Moscow File:Van Buren Street station entrance.jpg, Van Buren Street, Chicago File:An Entrance to the Paris Métropolitain by Hector Guimard 1902 - Sarah Stierch.jpg,

National Gallery of Art Sculpture Garden The National Gallery of Art Sculpture Garden is the most recent addition to the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. in the United States. It is located on the National Mall between the National Gallery's West Building and the Smithsonian ...

, Washington, D.C.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Paris Metro entrances by Hector Guimard 1900s architecture Art Nouveau architecture in Paris Art Nouveau railway stations Cast-iron architecture Paris Métro

Metro Metro, short for metropolitan, may refer to: Geography * Metro (city), a city in Indonesia * A metropolitan area, the populated region including and surrounding an urban center Public transport * Rapid transit, a passenger railway in an urba ...