Musée des Arts et Métiers

Museum of Arts and Crafts

Musée des Arts et Métiers
Established	1794
Location	60, rue Réaumur, 75003 Paris
Collection size	80,000
Visitors	250,000 / year

The Musée des Arts et Métiers (French pronunciation: [myze dez‿aʁ e metje]; English: Museum of Arts and Crafts) is an industrial design museum in Paris that houses the collection of the Conservatoire national des arts et métiers, which was founded in 1794 as a repository for the preservation of scientific instruments and inventions.

A 1985 supercomputer Cray-2

History

Since its foundation, the museum has been housed in the deserted priory of Saint-Martin-des-Champs on the Rue Réaumur in the 3rd arrondissement of Paris. Today the museum, which underwent major renovations in 1990, includes an additional building adjacent to the abbey, with larger objects remaining in the abbey itself.

Collection

The museum has over 80,000 objects and 15,000 drawings in its collection, of which about 2,500 are on display in Paris. The rest of the collection is preserved in a storehouse in Saint-Denis. Among its collection is an original version of the Foucault pendulum, the original model of Liberty Enlightening the World (commonly known as the Statue of Liberty) by Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi, some of the first planes (Clément Ader's Avion III, Louis Blériot's Blériot XI...), and Blaise Pascal's Pascaline (the first mechanical calculator).

The museum presents seven different collections : Scientific Instruments, Materials, Energy, Mechanics, Construction, Communication, Transportation. In the former church of St-Martin-des-Champs Priory are displayed cars, planes, the Foucault Pendulum and some other monumental objects.

The first portable steam engine and self propelled vehicle (automobile) Nicolas Cugnot's 1770 Fardier has been in this collection for over 200 years.

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  Medal of the Conservatoire national des arts et métiers (Paris)
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  The original Foucault pendulum at the Musée des Arts et Métiers in 2005
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  Clément Ader's Avion III at the Musée des Arts et Métiers
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  1840-1841 cameras obscurae for Daguerreotype called "Grand Photographe" produced by Charles Chevalier
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  Binoculars, by Father Chérubin d'Orléans, 1681, Musée des Arts et Métiers
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  Lavoisier's Laboratory, Musée des Arts et Métiers, Paris
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  Versions of Blaise Pascal's mechanical calculators
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  Ford T, 1908
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  Louis Charles Breguet, 1911
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  Hispano Suiza 1935
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  Grand Staircase
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  Arithmometer - calculating machine c. 1850
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  Peugeot 1909 at the Musée des Arts et Métiers
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  A wall of cars in Musée des Arts et Métiers
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  Celestial sphere driven by a clock mechanism, circa 1580

Cultural references

The museum appears in literature as the scene of the climax of the 1988 novel Foucault's Pendulum by Umberto Eco, and is featured in the 2019 documentary film about the Statue of Liberty, Liberty: Mother of Exiles.

Transportation

The museum can be accessed by the Paris Métro station Arts et Métiers. (The museum's entrance is at the corner of Rue Réaumur and Rue Vaucanson.)

See also

• List of museums in Paris
• List of tourist attractions in Paris
• Nicolas-Joseph Cugnot's fardier (a pioneering steam-powered road vehicle) is an exhibit

External links

• Official site (in French)
• Official site (in English)