Musée du quai Branly’s elevated galleries and planted approach create a gradual transition from the Seine-side city into its collections. Jean Nouvel designed the building around objects from Africa, Asia, Oceania, and the Americas, challenging the conventions of a traditional museum façade.
Quick facts
The museum opened in Paris in 2006 in a building designed by Jean Nouvel.
Gilles Clément’s garden covers 18,000 square metres and includes 169 trees.
The Atchan community’s Djidji Ayokwè talking drum, confiscated by French colonial authorities in 1916, was returned to Côte d’Ivoire on 20 February 2026.
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The approach to Musée du quai Branly is a gradual reveal. Gilles Clément’s garden softens the Seine-side city with winding paths and small rises; Jean Nouvel’s long, elevated building appears through the planting, its suspended colored galleries suggesting rooms within a room. The garden is not just a forecourt: it passes beneath the museum, so the architecture seems to hover over a living landscape.
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