Hotels near Palais de Tokyo

The Palais de Tokyo was inaugurated on 24 May 1937 for the Exposition Internationale des Arts et Techniques dans la Vie Moderne and reopened as a site for contemporary creation in March 2002. Anne Lacaton and Jean-Philippe Vassal, who won the Pritzker Prize in 2021, stripped and extended it again in 2012 rather than smoothing it over, which is why the interior still reads as bare concrete, exposed ducting and unfinished stairwells. It holds no permanent collection. Every show on the walls was produced in the building.

The reason it belongs on an Art Basel Paris list is the clock. The Grand Palais closes at 19:00 on all three public days, and the Palais de Tokyo runs to 22:00 six days a week and to midnight on Thursday. Thursday 22 October 2026 is the fair's ticketed vernissage evening, so a late Thursday here is the natural second half of that evening. Be honest with yourself about the programming, though: the commissions are often deliberately awkward, sound-heavy and unlabelled, and if you want framed paintings hung at eye level you will leave irritated.

Take metro line 9 to Iena and it is a 350 m walk, about four minutes; Alma-Marceau on the same line works too. Closed Tuesdays. Admission has recently been listed at 13 euros full and 9 euros reduced, free for under-18s, but the fee has moved more than once in two years, so check before you commit. The Grand Palais is 1.3 km east along the Seine, a 16-minute walk.

Pro Tip: Go on Thursday 22 October between 21:00 and midnight. It is the only night of the week the building runs past 22:00, and the same 13-euro ticket buys you the galleries with a fraction of the 18:00 crowd.