A Look Back at Paris's Hôtel de Ville

Check out this beautiful old postcard of Hôtel de Ville. French for "city hall", the building houses the City of Paris's administration. Hôtel de Ville stands in the city's 9th arrondissement and has been the location of the municipality of Paris since 1357. It serves multiple functions, housing the local administration, the Mayor of Paris (since 1977), and also as the venue for many large receptions. Since the French Revolution, the building has been the scene of a number of historical events, notably the proclamation of the French Third Republic in 1870 and the famous speech by Charles de Gaulle on August 25, 1944 during the Liberation of Paris when he greeted the crowd from a front window.