La Défense

La Défense (French: [la de.fɑ̃s]) is a major business district of the Paris Metropolitan Area and of the Île-de-France region, located in the commune of Courbevoie, and parts of Puteaux and Nanterre, just west of the city of Paris.

La Défense is Europe's largest purpose-built business district with 560 hectares (5.6 million square metres) area, 72 glass and steel buildings of which 18 are completed skyscrapers, 180,000 daily workers, and 3.5 million square metres (37.7 million sq ft) of office space.^[1] Around its Grande Arche and esplanade ("le Parvis"), La Défense contains many of the Paris urban area's tallest high-rises.

The district is located at the westernmost extremity of the ten-kilometre-long Historical Axis of Paris, which starts at the Louvre in Central Paris, and continues along the Champs-Élysées, well beyond the Arc de Triomphe along the Avenue de la Grande Armée before culminating at La Défense. The district is centred in an orbital motorway straddling the Hauts-de-Seine département municipalities of Courbevoie, Nanterre and Puteaux. La Défense is primarily a business district, and hosts a population of 25,000 permanent residents and 45,000 students.^[1][2] La Défense is also visited by 8,000,000 tourists each year,^[1] and houses an open-air museum.^[3]

History

La Grande Arche de la Défense and the Yaacov Agam Fountain (1977). The bronze sculpture on the left, seen from the rear, is La Défense de Paris by Louis-Ernest Barrias, after which La Défense is named.

Paris, with the skyscrapers of La Défense in the background and the Eiffel Tower in the foreground

The Grande Arche is the central and iconic building of La Défense. It is, with the Arc de Triomphe de l'Étoile and the Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel, the third arch on the Historical Axis of Paris.

La Défense is named after the iconic statue La Défense de Paris by Louis-Ernest Barrias, which was erected in 1883 to commemorate the soldiers who had defended Paris during the Franco-Prussian War.

In September 1958, The Public Establishment for Installation of La Défense (EPAD) buildings (of which the Esso Tower was the very first) were built and began to slowly replace the city's factories, shanties, and even a few farms. The Center of New Industries and Technologies (CNIT) was built and first used in 1958. These "first generation" skyscrapers were all very similar in appearance, limited to a height of 100 metres (330 ft). In 1966, the Nobel Tower was the first office skyscraper built in the area. In 1970, the RER line A railway was opened from La Défense to Étoile. In 1974, a contract for a Défense-Cergy high-speed hovercraft train was signed and soon abandoned.

In the early 1970s, in response to great demand, a second generation of buildings began to appear, but the economic crisis in 1973 nearly halted all construction in the area. A third generation of towers began to appear in the early 1980s. The biggest commercial centre in Europe (at the time), the Quatre Temps, was created in 1981. In 1982, the EPAD launched the Tête Défense competition to find a monument to complete the Axe historique, which eventually led to the construction of Grande Arche at the west end of the quarter. During the same period, hotels were constructed, the CNIT was restructured, and in 1992, Line 1 of the Paris Métro was extended to La Défense, which made the area readily accessible to even more of the city.

On Bastille Day 1990, French electronic composer Jean Michel Jarre staged an ambitious concert at the site, using the Grande Arche and three of the area's towers as projection screens, and building a pyramidal stage above the road. The free concert, titled simply Paris la Defense, attracted two million spectators, stretching all the way back to the Arc de Triomphe. This beat Jarre's own previous world record for the largest attendance for a musical concert.

After a stagnation in new development in the mid-1990s, La Défense is once again expanding and is now the largest purpose-built business district in Europe.

Important corporations headquartered at La Défense include Neuf Cegetel, Société Générale, Total, Aventis, Areva, and Arcelor. The tallest skyscraper, the Tour First belongs to AXA, constructed in 1974. It is 231 metres (758 ft) high, has 50 floors, and is the highest inhabited building in the Paris area (a title previously held by the Tour Montparnasse, which was the tallest inhabited building until the Tour First was renovated between 2007 and 2011, bringing it to its current height from a previous 159 metres (522 ft); the tallest structure in Paris is the Eiffel Tower).

On 9 September 2008, La Défense celebrated its 50th anniversary with a huge fireworks display.^[4]

In December 2005, Bernard Bled, CEO & Chairman of EPAD (La Defense Management & Development Office) announced an ambitious 9-year development plan called "La Defense 2006–2015".This important modernisation plan has to give a new dimension to the district and focuses on four main axes: regenerate outdated skyscrapers, allow new buildings, improve the balance between offices and residential housing and make the transport of local employees from their homes to La Défense easier. There are 3 aims: building 150,000 square metres (1,600,000 sq ft) of offices within demolition/rebuilding projects, building 300,000 square metres (3,200,000 sq ft) of offices within new projects, and building 100,000 square metres (1,100,000 sq ft) of housing.

The government confirmed in July 2006 this plan which has to be carried out around 2015. It is justified by the strong estate pressure, which plays in favour of building new skyscrapers near Paris. Those constructions have also the advantage to be more economical than little buildings. But it will have to overcome some difficulties: French economy faces a short-term slowdown; the government tries to balance tertiary sector employment in the whole region again, because La Défense today concentrates a major part of those jobs; and traffic is already saturated in the district, while it would need huge investments to extend transport infrastructures.

It launched high profile international competitions and/or construction greenlight of several key 300-to-320-metre (980 to 1,050 ft) tall sustainable development-style skyscrapers such as Tour Signal, Tour Phare, Hermitage Plaza, and Tour Generali. During said December 2005 Press Conference, EPAD released to the public an elaborate 3D animation film titled "La Défense 2015".

The district at night

Area specifications

• Divided into 4 major sectors
• 400 acres (1.6 km²)
• 3,500,000 square metres (38,000,000 sq ft) of offices
• 1,500 businesses
• 150,000 employees
• 20,000 residents
• 210,000 square metres (2,300,000 sq ft) of shops (including the 140,000 square metres (1,500,000 sq ft) Quatre Temps Shopping Mall)
• 2,600 hotel rooms
• 310,000 square metres (3,300,000 sq ft) of flagstone and sidewalk
• 110,000 square metres (1,200,000 sq ft) of greenery
• 60 modern art sculptures and monuments

• 

  The name of the district comes from the statue of La Défense de Paris which commemorates the Parisian resistance during the Franco-Prussian War.

• 

  Central esplanade, view from Grande Arche.

• 

  The CNIT with Tour Areva and Cœur Défense skyscrapers.

• 

  The stairs of the Grande Arche.

• 

  View from Arc de Triomphe.

• 

  View from Eiffel Tower.

• 

  Commercial center "Les Quatre Temps"

Open-air museum

Besides the representative architecture, the area also houses an open-air museum with 70 statues and pieces of modern art,^[3] including the following most remarkable works :

• 

  Takis, Bright Trees, c. 1990

Tallest buildings

• 

  Tour First

• 

  Tour Total

• 

  Société Générale Twin Towers

Completed highrise buildings above 90 m (295 ft) (1967–2014)

Upcoming highrise buildings (2016–2020)

Canceled projects

1. Tour Sans Fins (1989): 425 m (1,394 ft)
2. Tour Generali (2011): 319 m (1,047 ft)
3. Tour Signal (2009): 301 m (988 ft)

See also

• List of tallest buildings and structures in the Paris region

References

Further reading

• Schaugg, Johannes: High-Rise Buildings – La Défense, Books on Demand 2009, ISBN 978-3-8391-4523-4

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to La Défense.

Wikivoyage has a travel guide for La Défense.

• Satellite image from Google Maps
• la Défense de Paris
• Site officiel de l'EPAD (Établissement Public pour l'Aménagement de la Défense) (French)
• Connecting-Paris, web site created by the Chamber of commerce and industry of Paris to help companies setting up in La Defense (English)
• Expatriates Magazine, A printed publication distributed within various corporations situated in La Defense helping international employees integrate within the workplace and city (English)
• Les bâtiments de la Défense (French)
• Structurae: Structural engineering and architecture guide to Paris-La Défense (English)
• Défense Network

Coordinates: 48°53′30.27″N 2°14′27.00″E / 48.8917417°N 2.2408333°E / 48.8917417; 2.2408333

Tourism in Paris Landmarks Arc de Triomphe Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel Arènes de Lutèce Bourse Catacombs Conciergerie Eiffel Tower Flame of Liberty Grand Palais and Petit Palais Institut de France Les Invalides Odéon Opéra Bastille Opéra Garnier Panthéon Philharmonie de Paris Porte Saint-Denis Porte Saint-Martin Sorbonne Tour Montparnasse Museums Bibliothèque nationale Carnavalet Centre Pompidou/Beaubourg Cité des Sciences et de l'Industrie Jeu de Paume Louis Vuitton Foundation Musée des Arts Décoratifs Musée des Arts et Métiers Musée Cognacq-Jay Musée Grévin Musée Jacquemart-André Musée du Louvre Musée Marmottan Monet Musée national des Monuments Français Muséum national d'histoire naturelle Musée national du Moyen Âge Musée de l'Orangerie Musée d'Orsay Musée Picasso Musée du quai Branly Musée Rodin Palais de la Légion d'Honneur Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris Religious buildings Alexander Nevsky Cathedral American Cathedral American Church Grand Mosque Grand Synagogue La Madeleine Notre Dame Père Lachaise Cemetery Sacré-Cœur Saint-Augustin Saint-Étienne-du-Mont Saint-Eustache Saint-Germain-des-Prés Saint-Germain l'Auxerrois Saint-Jacques Tower Saint-Jean-de-Montmartre Saint-Paul-Saint-Louis Saint-Pierre de Montmartre Saint-Roch Saint-Sulpice Sainte-Chapelle Sainte-Clotilde Temple du Marais Val-de-Grâce Hôtels particuliers and palaces Élysée Palace Hôtel de Sens Hôtel de Soubise Hôtel de Ville Hôtel Matignon Luxembourg Palace Palais Bourbon Palais de Justice Palais-Royal Areas, bridges, streets and squares Avenue Foch Avenue George V Champ de Mars Champs-Élysées Covered passages Latin Quarter Place Dauphine Place de la Bastille Place de la Concorde Place de la République Place Denfert-Rochereau Place des États-Unis Place des Pyramides Place des Victoires Place des Vosges Place du Châtelet Place du Tertre Place Saint-Michel Place Vendôme Pont Alexandre III Pont d'Iéna Pont de Bir-Hakeim Pont des Arts Pont Neuf Rive Gauche Rue de Rivoli Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré Trocadéro Parks and gardens Bois de Boulogne Bois de Vincennes Jardin d'Acclimatation Jardin du Luxembourg Parc des Buttes Chaumont Parc Montsouris Tuileries Garden Région parisienne Chantilly La Défense Disneyland Paris Écouen Fontainebleau France Miniature Malmaison Musée de l'Air Musée Fragonard d'Alfort Parc Astérix Provins Rambouillet La Roche-Guyon Basilica of St Denis Saint-Germain-en-Laye Sceaux Stade de France Vaux-le-Vicomte Palace and Gardens of Versailles Vincennes Events and traditions Bastille Day military parade Fête de la Musique Nuit Blanche Paris Air Show Paris-Plages Republican Guard Paris Métro Bateau Mouche