Design
Can Paris Cool Live Beyond the City Lines?
The view from the city's electronic music scene.
Every city has boundaries, but those of Paris, demarcated by the Peripherique ring road, are firmer than most.
Real estate prices in the French capital have more than doubled in the last 15 years. Yet particularly compared to its geographically expanding counterparts in New York and London, the city's arts scene has floundered, obstinately, within the city lines. The gentrification of the center city is so thorough -- and so stifling -- that critics have proclaimed that Paris has, after more than a century of cultural supremacy, lost its edge.