Cape Town Lens: Portal, Saint-Laurent, 10ème, Paris, Île-de-France, France

A Cape Town District Six Museum tagged image from photographer – Billy Wilson Photography as published on Flickr.

Portal, Saint-Laurent, 10ème, Paris, Île-de-France, France

Image by Billy Wilson Photography

"The pediment over the portal features a painting by Jean-Paul Baize depicting “the Passion of Saint Lawrence”. The work is made with enamel paints baked onto lava, stone, a technique which resists great changes of temperature.It was finished in 1870.

Saint-Laurent (French pronunciation: ​[sɛ̃ lo.ʁɑ̃]) is a Roman Catholic church in the 10th arrondissement of Paris at 68 bis Boulevard de Magenta. A series of churches occupied the site since the 10th century. It is named for Saint Lawrence, an early Christian martyr who was executed in Rome by the Roman Emperor Valerian in 258 AD. It has been listed since 2016 as a monument historique by the French Ministry of Culture.

The earliest parts of the church date to the 10th century and 15th century, while the facade was rebuilt in the 19th century during the Second French Empire, to fit between into the intersection of three new boulevards built by Napoleon III and his deputy Baron Haussmann.

The architecture features a very ornate Flamboyant facade, constructed in the 19th century. The art and decoration includes an exceptional collection of 19th and 20th century stained glass windows. and an important collection of 19th-century religious paintings and sculpture.

The 10th arrondissement of Paris (Xe arrondissement) is one of the 20 arrondissements of the capital city of France. In spoken French, this arrondissement is referred to as dixième ("10th arrondissement of Paris" = "dixième arrondissement de Paris").

The arrondissement, called Entrepôt (warehouse), is situated on the right bank of the River Seine. The arrondissement contains two of Paris’s six main railway stations: the Gare du Nord and the Gare de l’Est. Built during the 19th century, these two termini are among the busiest in Europe.

The 10th arrondissement also contains a large portion of the Canal Saint-Martin, linking the northeastern parts of Paris with the River Seine.

Paris (French pronunciation: ​[paʁi]) is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,150,271 residents as of 2020, in an area of 105 square kilometres (41 square miles). Since the 17th century, Paris has been one of Europe’s major centres of finance, diplomacy, commerce, fashion, science and arts. The City of Paris is the centre and seat of government of the Île-de-France, or Paris Region, which has an estimated official 2020 population of 12,278,210, or about 18 percent of the population of France. The Paris Region had a GDP of €709 billion (8 billion) in 2017. According to the Economist Intelligence Unit Worldwide Cost of Living Survey in 2018, Paris was the second most expensive city in the world, after Singapore, and ahead of Zürich, Hong Kong, Oslo and Geneva. Another source ranked Paris as most expensive, on a par with Singapore and Hong Kong, in 2018.

The city is a major railway, highway and air-transport hub served by two international airports: Paris–Charles de Gaulle (the second busiest airport in Europe) and Paris–Orly. Opened in 1900, the city’s subway system, the Paris Métro, serves 5.23 million passengers daily; it is the second busiest metro system in Europe after the Moscow Metro. Gare du Nord is the 24th busiest railway station in the world, but the first located outside Japan, with 262 million passengers in 2015 Paris is especially known for its museums and architectural landmarks: the Louvre was the most visited art museum in the world in 2019, with 9.6 million visitors. The Musée d’Orsay, Musée Marmottan Monet, and Musée de l’Orangerie are noted for their collections of French Impressionist art, the Pompidou Centre Musée National d’Art Moderne has the largest collection of modern and contemporary art in Europe, and the Musée Rodin and Musée Picasso exhibit the works of two noted Parisians. The historical district along the Seine in the city centre is classified as a UNESCO Heritage Site, and popular landmarks in the city centre included the Cathedral of Notre Dame de Paris, on the Île de la Cité, now closed for renovation after the 15 April 2019 fire. Other popular tourist sites include the Gothic royal chapel of Sainte-Chapelle, also on the Île de la Cité; the Eiffel Tower, constructed for the Paris Universal Exposition of 1889; the Grand Palais and Petit Palais, built for the Paris Universal Exposition of 1900; the Arc de Triomphe on the Champs-Élysées, and the Basilica of Sacré-Coeur on the hill of Montmartre.

Paris received 38 million visitors in 2019, measured by hotel stays, with the largest numbers of foreign visitors coming from the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany and China. It was ranked as the second most visited travel destination in the world in 2019, after Bangkok and just ahead of London. The football club Paris Saint-Germain and the rugby union club Stade Français are based in Paris. The 80,000-seat Stade de France, built for the 1998 FIFA World Cup, is located just north of Paris in the neighbouring commune of Saint-Denis. Paris hosts the annual French Open Grand Slam tennis tournament on the red clay of Roland Garros. The city hosted the Olympic Games in 1900, 1924 and will host the 2024 Summer Olympics. The 1938 and 1998 FIFA World Cups, the 2007 Rugby World Cup, as well as the 1960, 1984 and 2016 UEFA European Championships were also held in the city. Every July, the Tour de France bicycle race finishes on the Avenue des Champs-Élysées in Paris." – info from Wikipedia.

Summer 2019 I did a solo cycling tour across Europe through 12 countries over the course of 3 months. I began my adventure in Edinburgh, Scotland and finished in Florence, Italy cycling 8,816 km. During my trip I took 47,000 photos.

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