Métropolitain

by Andrew Martin

First published 2023

Amazon

3.6(196)

Andrew Martin explores the Paris Métro as both a transport system and a way of reading the city above it. Beginning with the network’s creation around 1900, he follows the engineering led by Fulgence Bienvenüe, the Art Nouveau entrances designed by Hector Guimard and the stations, lines, signs and habits that developed as the railway became part of everyday Paris.

The book combines history with journeys through the contemporary system, moving repeatedly between underground infrastructure and the streets, neighbourhoods and cultural associations reached from it. Rather than treating the Métro only as an engineering achievement, Martin examines how its design, language and peculiarities express differences between Paris and other metropolitan railways while tracing the network from its fin-de-siècle origins through later expansion.