The 50s … A carefree era with full employment and progress! The peak of a consumer and leisure society where the purchasing power allowed each household to buy a TV, a refrigerator, or… a car !

A time when Paris had been turned into a giant open-airparking. Cars, everywhere, all the time, covered the most emblematic places of the capital.

As we can see, not everything was better before …

Quai de Conti, 1960

Canal Saint-Martin, 1953

Gare d’Orsay, 1970

A railway that is today a museum.

Hôtel de Ville, 1960

Place de la Concorde, 1957

Place de la Concorde, 1958

Le Louvre, 1958

Notre-Dame de Paris, 1960

Plateau Beaubourg, 1970

Île de la Cité, 1962

Nowadays Rue de Lutèce, a pedestrian street.

Palais Royal, 1980

Here are today the Colonnes Buren.

Place de la Bourse, 1970

Place de la Concorde 1958

Place des Vosges, 1960

Place Vendôme, 1961

Plateau Beaubourg, 1970

Quai des Grands Augustins, 1965

Notre-Dame de Paris, 1962

Place Vendôme, 1958