•• HOUSING ••
In the outer arrondissements, with their mix of modern and old residential buildings, there is a stronger community feel but they include shabby pockets. The 12th is a comparatively large arrondissement, which offers cheaper rents and a wide offer of middle to large apartments. It leads to the Vincennes park, one of the two largest around Paris (along with the Bois de Boulogne to the west). The 13th covers the city’s outer southeast, and contains a large Vietnamese community. It is a relatively old and quiet “suburb” of the Latin Quarter at its closest to the 5th. But it rapidly changes to a huge area of modern sky-rise buildings further east which, while they have none of the charm of old Paris, do offer sensational views and — not to be sniffed at — parking spaces. The 14th is attached to the Latin Quarter at Montparnasse and stretches down to the southern city limits. It has fewer modern buildings and has a lively community feel in most areas, bustling with shops, traders, cafés and quite a few small restaurants. Rents are, in the main, reasonable. It has the large and pleasant Montsouris park and quick access onto the southbound motorway and Orly airport. Staying south and moving west is the 15th, a highly residential arrondissement, with a rent range from the fairly cheap (especially for large apartments) to a minority of very expensive. It lacks big green spaces, although there are the André Citroën and Georges Brassens parks on its southern limits. The bourgeois 7th is one of Paris’ wealthiest postcodes and there is no cheap housing here. It stretches from the 6th, to its east, across to the Eiffel Tower, and is home to Unesco and most government ministry buildings.
The neighbouring 17th is a chic, high-rent area, but more accessible than the 16th. Its outlying areas are more populaire. It shares the pleasant Monceau park with the 8th. Overall, this is a quiet area at the end of the day when the offices close up. The 9th is a central arrondissement, dedicated to banks, insurance companies and lawyers, as well as department stores and small businesses. There some office-renovation apartments at comparatively reasonable prices, but this is one of Paris’ least-residential areas. The 8th is the élite part of the city centre, with the presidential Elysée Palace, the Champs-Elysées, the haute couture boutiques of the rue St Honoré and hotel palaces like the George V, the Plaza Athénée and the Crillon. Most of the 18th is a lively, residential workingclass area with a colourful ethnic mix. The buildings are mostly old, barring splashes of the new. The less salubrious parts notably include Clichy and the vulgar sin ‘city’ Pigalle. But there are pleasant enough areas, as well as shabby ones, and apartment space is generally pretty low-priced. The 19th is close to the gare du Nord with its Eurostar and Thalys train links. It is a less lively continuation of the 18th with many modern buildings and cheap rents. It has its own hill and park, the Buttes Chaumont. The outer west of Paris is gobbled up by the sprawling 20th. Rents are generally cheaper, particularly for large apartments, and there is a mix of old and new. At its heart is the legendary Père Lachaise cemetry (a sort of graveyard for stars). The wider, leafier areas are just off Nation square (in the neighbouring 12th arrondissement) and out towards the peripheral Porte de Vincennes.
The 16th, lying north of the river and on the west of the capital is something of a ghetto for the seriously rich. It runs from the Arc de Triomphe, spreading west out to the Bois de Boulogne at the city edge.
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