Jardin du Luxembourg
The creation of the garden began in 1612 when Marie de' Medici, the widow of King Henry IV, constructed the Luxembourg Palace as her new residence.
It covers 23 hectares (56.8 acres) and is known for its lawns, tree-lined promenades, tennis courts, flowerbeds, model sailboats on its octagonal Grand Bassin, as well as picturesque Medici Fountain, built in 1620.
In 1612 she had 2,000 elm trees planted; she directed a series of gardeners, most notably Tommaso Francini, to build a park in the style she had known as a child in Florence.
He was one of the early theorists of the new and more formal garden à la française, and he laid out a series of squares along an east–west alley closed at the east end by the Medici Fountain, and a rectangle of parterres with broderies of flowers and hedges in front of the palace.
In 1780, the Comte de Provence, the future Louis XVIII, sold the eastern part of the garden for real estate development.
The model boat pond in Conservatory Water in Central Park in Manhattan, New York City, is loosely based on that of one in the Jardin du Luxembourg.
The central axis of the garden is extended, beyond its wrought iron grill and gates opening to rue Auguste Comte, by the central esplanade of the rue de l'Observatoire, officially the Jardin Marco Polo, where sculptures of the four Times of Day alternate with columns and culminate at the southern end with the 1874 "Fountain of the Observatory", also known as the "Fontaine des Quatre-Parties-du-Monde" or the "Carpeaux Fountain", for its sculptures by Jean-Baptiste Carpeaux.
It was designed by Tommaso Francini, a Florentine fountain maker and hydraulic engineer who was brought from Florence to France by King Henry IV.
It fell into ruins during the 18th century, but in 1811, at the command of Napoleon Bonaparte, the fountain was restored by Jean Chalgrin, the architect of the Arc de Triomphe.
The long basin of water was built and flanked by plane trees, and the sculptures of the giant Polyphemus surprising the lovers Acis and Galatea, by French classical sculptor Auguste Ottin, were added to the grotto's rockwork.
Patrick Modiano heard the news he had won the 2014 Nobel Prize in Literature via a mobile phone call from his daughter while he was walking through Paris "just next to the Jardin du Luxembourg".
[12] Non-literary references include as the setting for a few episodes of French in Action, the 10th Joe Dassin's 1976 studio album Le Jardin du Luxembourg, the cover of Tame Impala's 2012 album Lonerism, the title of a song by the band The Ghost of a Saber Tooth Tiger and the gardens and palace being added as a mission in the video game Assassin's Creed Unity.
