Boosted by tourism, almost all French museums and monuments are reporting an increase in attendance. Unsurprisingly, the Louvre leads the way with 8.9 million visitors in 2023, a 14% increase over 2022, but below the spectacular pre-Covid-19 peaks. The world's largest museum is aiming to maintain the 30,000 daily visitor mark in 2024.

The Château de Versailles has returned to its pre-pandemic attendance levels, with 8.1 million admissions, 18% of which were Americans. The Musée d'Orsay and the Musée de l'Orangerie have seen a similar rebound, with over 5.1 million visitors, while the Musée du Quai Branly has recorded a 40% increase compared with 2022. A record was also set by the 14 sites managed by Paris Musées, which welcomed 5.3 million visitors in 2023. The 2,455,663 admissions recorded by Universcience, which manages the Cité des Sciences et de l'Industrie and Les Etincelles du Palais de la Découverte in Paris, finally confirmed the French appetite for science.

Smaller Parisian establishments also fared extremely well. The Musée de Montmartre, run by the privately-owned Kléber Rossillon group, recorded an astonishing 44% increase, with 180,000 visitors, largely thanks to its phenomenal exhibition on female surrealism, which attracted over 110,000 admissions in five months.

There's no magic formula: the best and biggest exhibitions always sell out. Like "Manet/Degas," which attracted 669,160 visitors to Musée d'Orsay in four months, and "Shocking! The Surrealist Worlds of Elsa Schiaparelli," which attracted over 330,000 visitors to the Musée des Arts Décoratifs, almost half its annual attendance. Successes such as "Basquiat × Warhol, à Quatre Mains" and "Mark Rothko" (which runs until April 2) allowed the Fondation Louis Vuitton to close 2023 with an increased total of 1.5 million admissions.

The upturn is also being confirmed in the rest of France. Opening in June 2022, the Cosquer Cave, recreated in the Villa Méditerranée in Marseille, was a hit with 800,000 visitors. With 555,607 admissions, the Musée du Louvre-Lens exceeded its 2019 figures by 4.2%, even though it was slightly down on its anniversary year in 2022. While anniversaries are often synonymous with resurgence, Marseille's MuCEM has reaped only modest benefits from its 10-year celebrations. The museum's attendance figures have stabilized at around 1.3 million visitors, most of them drawn by the breathtaking views from the terrace designed by Rudy Ricciotti.

Historic sites remain popular. The Centre des Monuments Nationaux, which oversees around a hundred buildings, recorded a 15% increase in visitor numbers, with 11 million visitors. Main attractions included the Arc de Triomphe, the Mont-Saint-Michel and the Panthéon in Paris, which passed the one million visitor mark. Inaugurated by President Emmanuel Macron on October 30, 2023, the Cité Internationale de la Langue Française in Villers-Cotterêts (northern France) had 30,000 visitors in two months.

You have 20% of this article left to read. The rest is for subscribers only.