Musée de l’Orangerie was built as a winter shelter for the Tuileries’ orange trees, then became home to Monet’s Water Lilies and the Walter-Guillaume collection. Its daylight-filled oval rooms turn painting into an environment, while lower galleries connect it to modern art in Paris.
Quick facts
The Orangerie was built in 1852 to shelter the Tuileries Gardens’ orange trees during winter.
Monet’s Water Lilies were installed in two oval rooms in 1927, after his offer of the works to France following the 1918 Armistice.
The French State acquired the Jean Walter and Paul Guillaume collection in two stages, in 1959 and 1963.
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The name Musée de l’Orangerie remembers the building’s first purpose. Built in 1852 beside the Seine, it sheltered the orange trees of the Tuileries Gardens through the winter. Today, the museum holds another garden inside: Claude Monet’s large Water Lilies cycle, arranged so that paintings and architecture work together. Look for the change in scale as you enter the two oval rooms. These are not separate views hung in sequence; they form a landscape that bends around the visitor.
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