The Hotel de Monaco, former residence of Marie-Catherine de Brignole, Princess of Monaco, and current residence of the Ambassador of the Republic of Poland in France, opens its doors to the public on 17 September 2022.
Completed in 1777, the work designed by Mr. Alexandre-Théodore Brongniart was originally a one-storey building, built in a neoclassical style, with white walls decorated with mirrors, columns, cornices and mouldings. The luxury, the voluptuousness and the modernity of its interior testify to the great means deployed at the time by the Principality of Monaco.
Acquired in 1838 by the banker and collector of Dutch origin, William Williams Hope, the building underwent significant changes, including a complete modification of its structure and interiors in the Versailles style. Two wings are added, the gardens are enlarged and the old rooms on the ground floor change destination. The work of modifications is entrusted to the greatest architects and decorators of the moment: Monnoyer, Fedel and Delafontaine.
The 1937 Universal Exhibition plans to integrate the plot on which the former headquarters of the Polish Embassy in Paris is located with the construction project of the future Palais des Musées d'art moderne-Palais de Tokyo. As a result, the Polish State acquired the Hotel de Monaco and installed the headquarters of the Polish Embassy in Paris in 1936. This is how this house is tied for good with the history of Poland to which it was somehow, by the characters of Princess Lubomirska, Davout and Chopin, already predestined…