Maison de Victor Hugo, the place des Vosges apartment since 1903

The Maison de Victor Hugo opened on 30 June 1903 on the place des Vosges, in the Hôtel de Rohan-Guéménée, where the writer rented a second-floor apartment from 1832 to 1848. The museum grew from the gift made in 1902 to the City of Paris by Paul Meurice, the poet’s friend and executor.

Hugo moved in in October 1832 with his wife Adèle. He received Lamartine, Vigny, Dumas and Balzac there. In his study he wrote Ruy Blas, Lucrèce Borgia, Les Burgraves and much of Les Misérables; he was elected to the Académie française while living here, and was still here in 1843 when his daughter Léopoldine died at Villequier.

After 1848 the apartment was altered, and the furniture sold in 1852. Meurice gathered drawings, manuscripts and mementoes. Closed from April 2019 to November 2020, the museum gained a workshop for children and a tea room on the courtyard.

In the 4th arrondissement, seven rooms in a row follow the writer’s life before, during and after exile: the red drawing room, the Chinese drawing room from Juliette Drouet’s house on Guernsey, Léon Bonnat’s portrait of Hugo and a reconstruction of the avenue d’Eylau bedroom where he died in 1885.