The Louvre Is Asking Architects to Submit Their Design Ideas for an Ambitious $316 Million Expansion

The Paris museum has launched a competition to design a new entrance and underground exhibition spaces, including one dedicated to the “Mona Lisa”

Sonja Anderson

– Daily Correspondent

July 10, 2025 5:22 p.m.

Last month, workers at the Louvre in Paris went on strike. Bemoaning overcrowding and inadequate staffing, they refused to open the museum’s doors, leaving massive lines of tourists waiting outside.

“It’s the Mona Lisa moan out here,” Kevin Ward, a visitor from Milwaukee, told the Associated Press’ Thomas Adamson during the strike. “Thousands of people waiting, no communication, no explanation. I guess even she needs a day off.”

Now, the museum is launching an architecture competition and soliciting designs for a $316 million expansion. The project will involve building a new entrance and a special room to display Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa. A global panel of experts will select five finalists in October, and the winner will be announced in early 2026.

Rachida Dati, France’s culture minister, wrote on X (formerly Twitter) that the competition will pave the way for “a new chapter for Paris and France’s cultural influence,” per a translation by the New York Times’ Aurelien Breeden.

French President Emmanuel Macron first proposed the idea in 2024 and officially announced the expansion earlier this year. But even after extensive planning, the process is still in its beginning stages. Construction isn’t expected to finish until 2031.

“We can’t wait six years for help,” Sarah Sefian, a Louvre gallery attendant and visitor services agent, told the AP. “Our teams are under pressure now. It’s not just about the art—it’s about the people protecting it.”

The Louvre is housed in a 16th-century palace built by the French king Francis I. It was a royal residence until the 17th century, when Louis XIV built the Palace of Versailles, a new home for France’s monarchs. Since then, the Louvre has become the most-visited art museum in the world. It now accommodates nearly nine million visitors per year.

Currently, the museum’s main entrance is in the Napoléon courtyard at the iconic glass pyramid designed by architect I.M. Pei, which was installed during the museum’s last major renovation in the 1980s. The newly announced competition seeks designs for a second entrance, to be located on the palace’s eastern side near the Seine River.

“The pyramid is a brilliant design, but it is no longer enough to welcome the nine million visitors who flock to our museum every year,” Laurence des Cars, the president of the Louvre, tells Le Monde’s Roxana Azimi, adding that a second entrance would “give the Louvre some breathing room.”

In contrast to Pei’s modernist pyramid, officials want the new entrance to blend into the 17th-century colonnade.

The expansion will include new exhibition spaces beneath the palace’s eastern courtyard, the Cour Carrée, and one of these spaces will be dedicated to the Mona Lisa. Leonardo’s enigmatic 16th-century portrait is currently on display in the Salle des États, surrounded by a railing and guards that prevent an ever-present crowd from getting too close.

“You don’t see a painting,” Ji-Hyun Park, a visitor from Seoul, told the AP. “You see phones. You see elbows. You feel heat. And then, you’re pushed out.”

Improving this experience is a central component of the Louvre’s call for design proposals. As Des Cars tells Le Monde, officials are asking architects to design a room of around 33,000 square feet to house the Mona Lisa, structured to enable short wait times and allow visitors to get close enough for “a genuine moment of contemplation.” Though connected to the rest of the museum, the Mona Lisa’s space will require separate timed-entry tickets.