Closed since 1985, the July Column has had a facelift, after a major restoration campaign started in 2016 with a view to opening its base to the public. The first visitors were able to discover the interior of the monument this weekend.
“The opening to the public of the necropolis of the column is now possible”, welcomed the National Monuments Center (CMN), who explains that the work carried out from 2016 to 2021 under the supervision of the chief architect of historical monuments, Lionel Dubois, “made it possible to clean up the structure of the column and restore all their splendor to its decorations “.
Two visits per day on weekends
A restoration campaign which now allows the monument to be opened to the public, but under very specific conditions “taking into account”, as the CMN points out, “the smallness of the spaces”. Only guided tours will be organized twice a day on Saturdays and Sundays, at 2:30 p.m. and 4:30 p.m., for groups of up to 18 people.
The #JulyColumn in a few numbers :
50.52 meters high
184,802 kg
Engineer weight: 4000 kg
Internal staircase: 240 steps
504 names of combatants engraved
700 combatants buried pic.twitter.com/LPIt2NjEdl
– the CMN (@leCMN) October 18, 2021
A visit of approximately 1h30 during which a guide-lecturer recalls the history of the Place de la Bastille, the Colonne de Juillet and the Parisian Revolutions, “with the support of documents and images presented on a digital tablet” . From the courtyard of the Hôtel de Sully (at 62, rue Saint-Antoine, 4th arrondissement), visitors will then have access to the various areas of the base, in particular those where the revolutionaries killed during the revolts of 1830 and 1848 lie.
Note also that the helical bronze staircase of 240 steps leading to the top of the Column – which rises to more than 50 meters in height – will remain inaccessible to the public for security reasons.