Interplay Volume 3: Re-Enchanting the Champs-Elysées

Editor’s Letter

Watching Paris celebrate pageantry, athleticism, and French heritage has been spectacular. These Olympic games—touted as the greenest and most equitable—exude high design and pride of place. Spectating has been a visual feast, both in terms of competition and seeing France’s national treasures serve as a backdrop to athletic sport.

It’s undeniable that the Games present a capital city at the forefront of 21st-century urbanism. Mayor Anne Hidalgo has transformed the city center, kicking out cars for bikes and pedestrians, has reclaimed the Seine as an urban swimming pool, and is working on addressing housing affordability. There has been a visible transformation in the quality of their public realm since they were awarded the Olympic bid. It’s difficult to imagine how Los Angeles will match, and ideally surpass, the creativity and beauty of the Paris Games. How exactly did they seize this moment so brilliantly? The answer (in part) begins well before Hidalgo took office when former French President Nicolas Sarkozy captured the collective imagination, seeding a new idea of ‘Greater Paris’ in 2007. He initiated the remaking of a modern Paris.

“These will be French-style Olympics using our unique heritage to reinvent the Games. It will not only show who we are but also what we are capable of.”
—Paris Olympic Committee Spokesperson