The Louvre Palace was originally a royal palace dating from the 1500’s. King Louis XIV moved the official palace to Versailles in the late 1600’s, but the Louvre continued housing government offices until the beginning of the French Revolution in 1789. The medieval buildings then became home to the Musée du Louvre.
The pyramid (Pyramide du Louvre) is a young structure. It was commissioned by François Mitterrand in 1984 and completed in 1989. Its purpose is to manage the crowds coming in and out of the museum.
The photo below is a picture of the Louvre at night. The lights and the reflections really bring the main courtyard (Cour Napoléon)to life starting around dusk.
I took several shots of the Louvre courtyard, but the photo below is definitely my favorite. It lays the old with the new, the rough with the smooth, glass and metal with stone, and all under the warm glow of the evening lights.
