Petit Palais – Musée des Beaux-Arts de la Ville de Paris

The building itself entices with its gilt-framed doors that open up from its sweeping entranceway there on Avenue Winston Churchill, just steps from the Champs-Elysées. Because its neighbor across the street, the Grand Palais, tends to get all the attention and the big name exhibitions and shows, it sort of just humbly waits to be noticed. One would never assume that entrance is free to the museum, but it is. Its temporary exhibits require a purchased ticket, but its permanent collections, featuring the history of the city as represented by French paintings and furniture, is a draw. As is, quite simply, the 1902 building that is flanked by the Seine and Pont Alexandre III on one side and the Champs-Elysées and the Grand Palais on the other.