The Ile de la Cite, a small island in the middle of the Seine River, is the cradle of Paris geographically at the very heart of the capital of France.

The right bank of the Seine is dominated by the large perspectives due to the avenues designed by Haussman in the 19th century. The most prominent of them is the one extending from the Louvre (Place de la Concorde) to the Arc de Triomphe, through the Champs Elysees, the most famous avenue in Paris. The Cathedral of Notre-Dame and the Sainte Chapelle are architectural masterpieces while Haussmann's wide squares and boulevards influenced late 19th - and early 20th - century town planning the world over.