Henry IV had begun construction on the…

Henry IV had begun construction on the Place des Vosges, originally known as the Place Royale, in 1605.

A true square (one hundred and forty meters on each side), it embodies the first European program of royal city planning.

It has been built on the site of the former Hôtel des Tournelles, a royal residence, and its gardens, where in a tournament Henry II had been wounded and died.

Catherine de Medicis had had the Gothic pile demolished, and she removed to the Louvre.

Inaugurated in 1612 with a grand carrousel to celebrate the wedding of Louis XIII and Anne of Austria, the Place des Vosges, is the prototype of all the residential squares of European cities that are to come.

What s new about the Place Royale in 1612 is that the housefronts have all been all built to the same design, probably by Jacques Androuet II du Cerceau, of red brick with strips of stone quoins over vaulted arcades that stand on square pillars.

The steeply pitched blue slate roofs are pierced with discreet small-paned dormers above the pedimented dormers that stand upon the cornices.

Only the north range is built with the vaulted ceilings that the "galleries" are meant to have.

Two pavilions that rise higher than the unified roofline of the square center the north and south faces and offer access to the square through triple arches.

Though they are designated the Pavilion of the King and of the Queen, no royal personage has yet lived in the aristocratic square.

The Place des Vosges initiates subsequent developments of Paris that will create a suitable urban background for the French aristocracy.