Russian Paris

With the Russian Paris tour you will discover Russian culture throughout its history, all around the French capital, and above all religious institutions, well known and sometimes hidden, one of which containing two trees growing inside!

You’ll get to see amazing nineteen century typical wooden Russian houses in a back alley usually closed to the public and learn about the lives in Paris of famous Russian representatives, such as Turgenev, Bunin, Pushkin or Chagall as well as a rather more contemporary Russian presence, through nightlife and gastronomy.
Tour also available with a private VIP car.

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Description

Explore Russian Paris !

Practical Informations
• Meeting Point: Métro Ourcq (line 5)
• Duration : 3h30
• Walk and métro (private transportation available)
Private group tour at any date (300€/group) + church entrance ticket

The Russian Paris walk, is a guided tour that enables you to understand the Russian presence in Paris, between the massive influx of the 1920’s, postwar renewal and contemporary period.
In the 1920s, the Russians were thousands to flee the Revolution and the Civil War: the number of Russian immigrants reached in 1923, 863,000 people.
The Russian diaspora was then essentially consisting of a small circle where everyone knew one another: aristocrats, officers of the White Russian Army, artists… This little world, although very heterogeneous, kept a common dream: to one day return to Russia. Various shops, restaurants, taverns, churches, schools and even higher education establishments flourished in the 16th district, privileged by aristocrats, the 15th or Boulogne, where landed the officers of the White Russian Army who worked at Citroën and Renault, but also in the close suburbs, with affordable prices back then.
Russian immigrants, often already familiar with the culture and the French language had recreated a miniature Russia while integrating into French society. An intellectual elite cut off from its origins and Russian cultural milieu had no choice but to start from scratch in creating associations, theaters and other cultural structures.

If we woke up one morning of May 2, 1930, lazing in bed, we could consider: what shall we do tonight? Shall we go to the conference by Vladimir Iljine “Creation and destruction of the world” at the Academy of Religious Philosophy, 10 Boulevard Montparnasse? to the party of writer Remizov at the Hotel Lutetia? Or the literary and artistic spectacle of Turgenev Association with players of the Khudozhestvenny Teatr Moscow?

This intense period is now over. Descendants of the original immigrants have long been assimilated and the Russian community was widely amputated by the battles of the Second World War.
If “Little Russia” of the past is long gone, the current Russian presence is expanding in Paris, in different areas. The community is stronger than 40 000 people and our walk will show how it reveals today very active culturally.

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