Touring without tourists

When I woke this morning I thought I was at home. I had set the alarm for 6.30 instead of 7.30, and when it went off I reached over to turn off Megan’s nose. ‘Other side’, she said, just before I made contact.

We’ve been to three of the monsters – Musée d’Orsay, the Louvre, and Versailles. All impressive, and packed to the rafters with two things: masterpieces and tourists. Is there anywhere where you can get the first but not the second?

Yes. We visited two such places today: the Musée Marmottan-Monet in the 16th arrondissement, and the Musée Jacquemart-André in the 8th.

Both started life as private collections. Paul Marmottan was a historian of the Napoleonic period, who lived in a former hunting lodge near the Bois de Boulogne. When he died in 1932 he left his house and collection of First Empire art to the Académie des Beaux Arts. In 1966 Michel Monet donated his father Claude’s collection of paintings held at Giverny. This included not only paintings by Monet himself but also paintings by his fellow impressionists. In 1996 Berthe Morisot’s grandson bequeathed his collection. So now the Marmottan has the world’s largest collection of Monets and Morisots. The Monets are mostly late: several Water Lilies and other paintings of Giverny, one of the Rouen Cathedral series, one of the Houses of Parliament, and the painting from which the movement took its name, Impression: Sunrise. These are housed in a large, specially-built gallery below the rear garden. The Morisots take up two rooms of the ground floor and are simply beautiful – they are what chocolate-box artists aspire to, pastel without being syrupy, in Megan’s words.

Up the Metro from La Muette to Miromesnil, and a short walk around to 158 Boulevarde Haussmann. The Musée Jacquemart-André was the mansion of Edouard André, a banker, and his wife Nélie Jacquemart, a painter. The house was built specifically to show off their collection of Italian art, as a work of art in itself. The décor is overblown Second Empire style, but the pictures are great. They include a Saint George and the Dragon by Uccello (one of my favourite paintings), a few Mantegnas and a couple of Botticellis.

Neither museum is crowded, and the customers are very upmarket – no bogan tourists in tracky-daks yelling at each other. The products in the shop at the Jacquemart-André are very high-end, a step up from the trinkets at the Louvre. Like many museums in Paris there are a lot of French, but many seem to go just for the restaurant (which has free entry). You may have to wait for a table but it’s worth it. For example, their lunch special (€16.50) is the quiche du jour plus a pastry. The quiche was exquisite, with a light shortcrust pastry and caramelised onions on the base. We both had a chocolate and caramel slice, the caramel tasting of honeycomb. Followed up by a traditional hot chocolate, it was the best meal we’ve had in Paris yet.

We sat on the patio overlooking the courtyard, where small children played hide and seek and older children played chasings around trees in planters that seem especially placed for just that purpose. People sat on benches and enjoyed the sun, and no one was in a hurry. For elegance and light, I prefer the Marmottan. But for food and relaxing…