Rive Gauche

For other uses, see Left Bank.

The arrondissements of Paris, with the Seine River bisecting the city. The Rive Gauche is the southern half.

La Rive Gauche (The Left Bank) is the left bank of the Seine River in Paris, as one faces downstream. Here the river flows roughly westwards, cutting the city into two: the Right Bank to the north and the Left Bank to the south.

The Left Bank is one of the city's most romantic districts. This is the Paris of another era; the Paris of artists, writers, and philosophers, including Pablo Picasso, Henri Matisse, Jean-Paul Sartre, Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and dozens of other members of the great artistic community at Montparnasse. Some of its famous streets are the Boulevard Saint-Germain, Boulevard Saint-Michel, and the Rue de Rennes.

More than simply a geographical region, the Left Bank has become a name for a particular lifestyle, fashion, or "look". In 1966 Yves Saint-Laurent launched a ready-to-wear line by the name Rive Gauche. The collection was an attempt to democratize fashion, introducing elements of garments of the lower classes into high fashion, such as the leather jacket.

The Latin Quarter is a Left Bank area, in the 5th arrondissement, so named because originally Latin was widely spoken by students in the vicinity of the University of Paris.

[edit] See also

• Rive Droite
• Arrondissements of Paris