Garden of The 14th Distric

Except for the 12^th arrondissement, which includes the Bois de Vincennes, the 14^th has the highest amount of park acreage in Paris, ranging from the tiny Papillon garden off the little rue de Châtillon to the 16-hectare Parc Montsouris. Those are the spaces open to the public. Then there are the private courtyards, villas and cobblestone, verdant dead ends. The sisters of Saint Joseph de Cluny still grow their own tomatoes on the rue Méchain. The ring road is greed and red, with the red of the brick apartment houses lining the Boulevard Brune mixing with the green of many gardens.

The 14^th arrondissement is also home to all the major hospitals of Paris as well as the Santé prison, the only house of detention still inside the city limits. The population of the residential Montsouris quarter has been declining, but in the Plaisance neighborhood it is increasing. The "three mounts" - Montparnasse, Montsouris and Montrouge - have always been crowded: they were home to the laboring classes and workshops, factories and street trades before artists, painters and writers moved in. The china menders and bougnats - cafes that originally sold coal - are gone, and the carters now drive vans. But in winter, a glazier and a grinder still make their rounds in this neighborhood, which seems like a link to happier times.

The 14^th arrondissement actually led a double life. During the week, the neighborhood was fairly quiet, with retirees straight out of a Balzac novel shuffling around in their slippers in the morning. And then came Friday, when all Paris seemed to flock to Montparnasse until Sunday night. That has not changed, although the neighborhood has a lot more antique shops than it used to. Many of them specialize in bric-a-brac, small furniture and china The area around the rue de l'Ouest, the rue Raymond-Losserand and the rue du Château is changing, with old buildings coming down and new ones going up, but they will be lower than the ones in the 13^th arrondissement.

The rue du Château leads to the neo-classical Place de Catalogne designed by Ricardo Bofill based on a Greek temple and a Roman arena. Nearby is the Place de Séoul and the Hôtel de Massa, an eighteenth century "folie" that once stood on the Champs Elysées. In 1927, it was threatened with demolition and moved to its present location. Every stone, beam, panel and floorboard was carried across the Right Bank and faithfully rebuilt to house the Société des Gens de Lettres.

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