École Spéciale d'Architecture

The École Spéciale d’Architecture is marked by its garden, where stone columns from the ruins of the Tuileries Palace stand. Founded in eighteen sixty-five by the engineer Émile Trélat, the school emerged as an alternative to the École des Beaux-Arts, which many architects then considered too rigid for the changing needs of their profession. Trélat designed these buildings himself, making them the first in France created specifically to house an architecture school.