Lille, Northern France’s Delightful Capital

The Chamber of Commerce building in downtown Lille, France.
The Chamber of Commerce building in downtown Lille, France.

A little Parisian Flair in the North of France

By Anika Redhed

duck art couple
The author, right, enjoys the Palais des Beaux-Arts in Lille, France.

Lille had been on my wishlist ever since I had read that their art museum is the second largest in France, after the Louvre.

A promise as sweet as cotton candy. Pink cotton candy. Add names like Rembrandt, Rodin, and Monet and the art institute had lured me in with just a few words.

Although its name alone could have done that, for it was not simply called museum, it was a palace. A French palace. It was the ‘Palais des Beaux-Arts’.

I was 17 when I visited Paris and slacked at least 5 miles through The Louvre to find the Mona Lisa; a painting so big in name, but so small in size. The museum itself did leave quite an impression on me. In my memory it is so big, it could easily swallow 12 French villages and a folded Eiffel Tower.

Or provide housing for the population of half a Chinese city. So a museum being second to that had to be big. When I was in Lille I planned to roam around the art palace’s rooms for the entire day, taking in as much of the art as possible.

Romulus and Remus in Lille.
Romulus and Remus in Lille.

I arrived at the doorsteps of the Palais des Beaux-Arts at opening time and there was already a small line waiting to get in. Instead of complaining, I just figured this meant how good it had to be.

Old Paintings and Donald Duck

They have a collection of paintings ranging from the Middle Ages until the 20th century, sculptures and plans-reliefs; maquettes of city maps. On top of that, they host a lot of temporary expositions.

To my surprise, they had a Donald Duck year. Disguised as ancient art, they had placed duck beaks in famous pieces.

In a glass display, accompanied by Egyptian urns, was a small mummy with a huge snout sticking out. And next to Chinese porcelain was a big-belly-Buddha with a beak.

It was so well done, that it was sometimes hard to find the Duck-art. I had to brisk through the large, high ceilinged ceramics hall twice before I had found the Buddha. It was like a treasure hunt combined with art. Cotton candy of the sweetest kind.

A duck mummy.
A duck mummy.

I rushed past Romulus and Remus being nurtured by Pluto to a contemplative Donald Rodin. I had to rush, obviously, since I wanted to see as much as possible of what the museum had on offer.

But to my surprise, after taking in everything they had on display from Vermeer to Manet, I was done. I had visited all the beautiful halls, gazed at the abundantly decorated staircases, checked off all the Duck-art and zigzagged past white, 6-packed Roman men.

And I still had a good part of my day left. At officially 1/3rd the size of its big sister in Paris, it is still of good size, but it was so much smaller than I had anticipated. I guess my expectations had been too high. It was cotton candy on a stick, just a small portion.

Opera House in Lille.
Opera House in Lille.

Only 30 minutes away, in the small town of Lens, is the Louvre-Lens, a spectacular new museum opened in 2012. It’s an outpost of its famous Paris mothership, with many classic works of art in an expansive 500,000 square foot flat layout. Read more about Louvre-Lens.

A Former Industrial Town

Lille used to be an industrial town, famous for its cotton industry, dubbed as ‘the Manchester of the south’. Industrial towns usually have the appeal of a rotten apple, but that was not the case here.

The town is just south of the border with Belgium, which leads to an interesting mixture in architecture. Buildings with brown and red bricks make you think you ended up in Flanders.

Whereas a little Napoleonic influence and a couple of centuries under the French flag, have given it a classy style. On a sunny day, the streets filled with live music and a book market under neoclassical arcades, one could think to have ended up in some kind of little Paris.

There is more. Churches that spell Gothic with a capital G, filled with so many arcades, stained glass, and adornments that one can barely take it all in.

Lille’s Chamber of Commerce Tower

IMG 1083An opera house in neoclassical grandeur, a chamber of commerce with a tower that will make your lower jaw drop down automatically and even an arch resembling its famous triumphal brother in Paris.

Facades come in orange, white, yellow and brown, with or without stained glass with more crooked than straight lines.

ten flavors of Macarons in Lille.
Ten flavors of Macarons in Lille.

Between shops selling e-cigarettes and cheap pizza, there are some sweet jewels. Bakeries with a large choice of cakes that all look tasty even if you don’t like cakes.

Parlors selling ice cream with the most tempting names and sugar factories selling macarons in at least ten different flavors. It is all topped off with a large plaza containing a fountain and the obligatory statue on a pillar.

Sleeping: For a relatively cheap hotel, try Ibis Budget. The rooms have all the need, and nothing more. The bathrooms are a separate plastic cabin in the room. Very small, but sufficient.

Other options are Crowne Plaza or Best Western. Or try your luck at Airbnb.

Eating: There seem to be quite a few places that want to make an easy buck from the ignorant tourist, so maybe it is better to first ask around or check online reviews. We have had some overpriced coffee, served without a smile, that was very similar to drainage water.

We had a nice evening at ‘3 Brasseurs’. They brew their own beer, right inside the house.

Sights: Stroll around the old town, look at the facades and all the details. The Citadel is worth a visit, if alone for the grand park around it. The city also houses a museum for modern art and a museum of industry. The entire list can be found here

The website of the city of Lille with loads of information for tourists.

Added to all this multi-cultural facade beauty is a modern part; the train station and shopping mall are both constructed in the ‘the more glass the better’-style. Together with a couple of streets lined with terraces providing food from different cuisines, this city caters to all kinds of tastes.

If you are looking for a weekend trip and like your tracks not too beaten, then Lille could be the place to visit. And if you are not too picky, you can even imagine you are in Paris’ little sister. There is also regular TGV fast train service from Paris to Lille.

Anika_RedhedAnika Redhed is a Dutch psychologist with a passion for other cultures and writing. She has lived in several countries, from the US to China, and still travels to unknown European cities and other continents, mostly off the beaten track, sometimes right on it.

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