Page 242 - (DK Eyewitness) Travel Guide - Paris

240  P ARIS AREA B Y AREA

Cité des Sciences et de l’Industrie

This hugely popular science and technology museum occupies the
largest of the old Villette slaughterhouses, which now form part of
a massive urban park, Parc de la Villette. Architect Adrien Fainsilber
has created an imaginative interplay of light, vegetation and water
in the high-tech, five-storey building, which soars 40 m (133 ft)
high, stretching over 3 ha (7 acres). At the museum’s heart is the
Explora exhibit, a fascinating guide to the worlds of science and
technology. Visit ors can take part in computerized games on space,
the earth, transport, energy, design and sound. On other levels,
there is a children’s science city, a planetarium, a library and shops.
The Main Hall
With a soaring network of
shafts, bridges, escalators
and balconies, the vast
Main Hall has a cathedral-
. The Story of like atmosphere.
the Universe
An exploration of the
birth of the universe, this
exhibit takes you back
13.7 billion years to the
creation of the first atom.

400-seat Hemispheric
auditorium screen

Main lobby

La Géode
This vast sphere houses a hemispherical cinema
screen, 1,000 sq m (11,000 sq ft), showing IMAX
and 3D films. The Géode is prohibited for women
more than six-months pregnant.

KEY
1 The moat was designed by
Fainsilber so that natural light could
penetrate into the lower levels of
the building.
2 The Globalo-Scope is a 3D
projection on a globe, which shows
climate change and several other
phenomena on a global scale.
Planetarium
3 The greenhouse is a square Explore our solar system in
hothouse, 32 m (105 ft) high and immersive films and sessions
wide, linking the park to the building. with astronomy specialists.

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