The space is fun an you can touch everything

How do you get French people, and Parisians in particular, to come back to Musée Rodin while foreign tourists usually list it first or second on their agenda? You organize a free modeling and drawing studio for children. And they love it! Amélie Simier had created these workshops at Musée Bourdelle where she used to work and for the third year, her teams have reorganized the chapel into a children’s paradise. I had to borrow some nieces and nephew to test the operation and it was a great success. They even said thank you when their parents promised them an ice cream in the gardens…

A four year old takes himself for “Le Penseur ” by Rodin

Called l’Atelier Rodin “play, create, move”, it provides blackboards and magnetic boards where you assemble a statue. It asks you to take the attitude of Rodin’s sculptures like “the Thinker”  and lends color pencils. There are revolving statues which you are encouraged to touch, material like stone marble and clay which again you need to touch and it even has a toboggan. The three year old had to be led around but the five years old were autonomous…and loved it.

You can run and turn into a statue at 1, 2, 3

A small library on top of stairs,  a running corridor to play games, the space is very well conceived for physical activities. You are encouraged to exhibit your sculptures and drawings on special shelves and children play with each other. A father was patiently sculpting a bust of a lady with curls, grandparents were trying to control young kids, babysitters are relieved to see that they can sit down… It seems that everyone is happy. And maybe later in life, will these young devils remember that they played and created art in the Rodin museum…

What a delight it is to play with a revolving sculpture

The bonus of the visit is to go and run into the gardens afterwards, they are beautifully kept and have original Rodin statues to see. If your children are a little older you can also take them into the Hotel particulier and visit the permanent collection.

Musée Rodin’s gardens are full of hedges where you can hide and have a tea room with ice creams

Musée Rodin and the children’s atelier are open every day except Tuesdays until September 1 and the visit is free under 18.