Paris was arranged as a spiral on the map not simply for decorative appeal but as the product of many years of disorderliness and reconstruction; countless walls going up and down through the years; and therefore; if you understand that, the city suddenly becomes much easier to reason through and less random than what you may have thought.
The “snail shell” lay-out that is so famous today did not come about as a modern design element. It grew into existence from continued outer expansion (similar to tree rings) as cities continue to reconstruct themselves following wars, revolutions, and other major political changes.
Before examining how this spiral formed, let’s go back to the beginning of everything: not the great boulevards or swanky neighborhoods, but a little island located in the Seine River: Île de la Cité. Long before there were cafés and museums, there was a small tribe of people who had settled on this site, taking advantage of its protective and strategic geographical location. It makes perfect sense.
After the Romans arrived, as they tended to do, they made it a more well-planned city. They expanded the area of development beyond the island and laid out streets in a nice, uniform pattern. One of their major roads is still just somewhat intact today; however, you probably don’t know it because it is almost always hidden in full view. Even today, in Paris, you will be walking along the same route as thousands of years ago, but you probably wouldn’t think about that.
After the Roman Empire fell, Paris went through its own ungainly period, with invasions, changing leaders, and many other random acts that contributed to the way Paris was formed as a large city. Instead of allowing the expansion to take place uniformly throughout the entire city, the development of Paris occurred through individual bursts, responding to whatever crisis or opportunity presented itself at the time.
Almost every time Paris began to build a wall around herself to provide protection from an outside attack, it marked the limit of Paris as of that point in time. After the construction of the wall, there was an increase in the number of inhabitants, and Paris would extend past the limit, thus requiring a new wall to be built further out. After going through this process several times over many centuries, the result will be a city that has multiple layers.
Most of the walls may no longer exist; however, the wall’s outline still remains as part of the street and district layout. Thus, the city of Paris combines an organized system with slight chaos.
Initially, the walls were used for an entirely different purpose than just protection; rather, one of the walls was built to control the trade of goods entering the city (an imposing tax checkpoint). To enter Paris, items had to pass through designated gateways and you had to pay taxes/refusal on the goods brought into the city by having them checked by guards; certainly, this method of regulation was not exactly romantic but certainly effective.
In the 19th century, things changed for the city of Paris when Napoleon III made the determination that a complete renovation was needed. The overcrowded, unhealthy, and generally maze-like conditions of the city warranted a redesign; Baron Haussmann came to Paris with the directive “Start Over”.
London had contemporary neighborhoods from the middle ages removed. Broad boulevards replaced narrow medieval streets. Parks, sewer systems, and pedestrian pathways were also added to the city. This project (urban renewal) became one of the greatest urban redevelopment projects in history and helped to create the beautiful and uniform characteristics found in Paris today.
This transformation was not without cost; thousands of buildings were demolished, and hundreds of thousands of people were displaced. Nonetheless, the alteration to the visual representation of Paris became an entirely new identity for the city.
In the meantime, city limits continued to expand outward. The addition of new districts meant Paris was ultimately reorganized into 20 arrondissements (districts) making it what you now see today. Instead of these being arranged in a simple grid, they were numbered in a spiral pattern starting from the center and working to the outside.
When you walk through the streets of Paris, you are walking through time. The city center contains the oldest areas of the city, while each outside layer represents a new chapter in the history of Paris. The further out you go, typically, the more recent the buildings will appear.
Once you grasp this concept, navigating your way around Paris becomes much easier. You no longer perceive it as just a maze of streets; you begin to recognize that there are patterns that are formed in the arrangement of the streets—some streets curve for a reason; in some areas you feel cretaceous, while in others you feel polished and grand.
In addition to this, Paris, through all of this turmoil, evolved into a global icon. It endured both world wars, saw monarchies rise and fall and revolutions shake things upside down—all the while adapting to those changes. It has taken in all different eras and combined all this history to form its character.
Ultimately, Paris is a visual representation of everything that has occurred over the last 2,000 years, including growth through adversity, innovation, and ambition.
