Musée Jacquemart-André

Banker Édouard André and his wife, painter Nélie Jacquemart, built this mansion on Boulevard Haussmann between 1869 and 1875 specifically to display the art collection they assembled together on regular trips to Italy — a genuine passion project rather than simply a wealthy household with paintings on the walls. Jacquemart, childless and widowed, bequeathed the house and its entire collection to the Institut de France on her death in 1912, on the condition that nothing be changed, which is why the museum still feels like a private home rather than an institution.

The collection's strength is Italian Renaissance art — Uccello, Mantegna, Botticelli and Perugino among the highlights — alongside 18th-century French decorative arts and portraiture, all still displayed in the couple's original rooms: a grand double-helix staircase, a glass-roofed winter garden, and a music room used for private concerts. The scale is intimate rather than overwhelming, closer to the Frick Collection in New York than to a national museum.