The world’s most famous portrait is moving, and it is about time. If you have stepped foot inside the Salle des États over the last decade, you already know the ugly truth. Visiting the Mona Lisa isn't an art appreciation experience. It is a grueling, elbow-to-elbow survival sport where thousands of tourists shove past each other just to hold a smartphone over a sea of heads. You get less than 60 seconds to squint at a relatively small, 30-inch panel behind thick protective glass before security ushers you along.
It is a bad deal for the public, and frankly, it is a bad deal for the painting.
French President Emmanuel Macron and Louvre Director Laurence des Cars recognized the system was broken. Under the ambitious "Louvre New Renaissance" project, the museum is pushing forward with an estimated €700 million to €800 million overhaul. The massive master plan will shift Leonardo da Vinci’s masterpiece out of its traditional home and into a dedicated, 33,000-square-foot subterranean gallery space specifically tailored to handle the crushing volume of mass tourism.
But fixing the crowd problem requires radical changes to the museum’s historic layout, and the architecture world is already deeply divided on the shortlist of firms picked to execute this delicate transformation.
The Five Firms Fighting to Remake the Museum
The Louvre launched a high-stakes international design competition to figure out how to pull off this expansion without ruining the aesthetic integrity of a former royal palace. A 21-person international jury whittled the applicants down to a shortlist of five heavy-hitting architectural teams.
Each team brings a wildly different philosophy to the table. Take a look at who is in the running:
- AL_A (Amanda Levete Architectes) with NC Nathalie Crinière: This British-French alliance combines Levete’s bold, modern intervention style with elite local exhibition design.
- Diller Scofidio + Renfro with Architecturestudio: The New York firm famous for the High Line and The Shed is teaming up with French experts, bringing immense experience in heavy foot-traffic urban spaces.
- SANAA with Dubuisson Architecture: The Japanese powerhouse SANAA already knows the Louvre’s DNA. They designed the stunning, minimalist Louvre-Lens branch in northern France.
- Sou Fujimoto Architects: Known for hyper-light structures that blur the lines between nature and built environments, Fujimoto offers a distinct Eastern minimalist perspective.
- Selldorf Architects with Studios Architecture: Annabelle Selldorf is the undisputed master of gallery spaces, renowned for elegant, understated historical renovations like New York’s Frick Collection.
The task ahead of these finalists is monumental. They aren't just designing a pretty room for a famous painting. They have to hack into the infrastructure of the most-visited museum on earth and fix a logistical nightmare that has been building for decades.
Why the I.M. Pei Era Failed to Keep Up
To understand why the Louvre needs a multi-million euro subterranean expansion, you have to look back at the last major renovation. In 1989, architect I.M. Pei shook up the art world by introducing the iconic glass and steel pyramid in the Napoléon courtyard.
It was a brilliant piece of modernist design, but it had a fatal flaw. It was engineered to handle roughly 4 million visitors per year.
Today, the Louvre welcomes nearly 9 million annual guests. The museum is actively aiming to scale up to 12 million visitors. The result of this explosive growth? A leaked memo from director Laurence des Cars described the modern Louvre experience as a "physical ordeal." The space beneath the pyramid lacks proper insulation, creating uncomfortable temperature swings for guests and staff alike. Worse, the glass structure amplifies noise into a constant roar, and structural leaks threaten the security of the collection.
The pyramid simply ran out of room. The new expansion shifts the entry focus to the eastern side of the palace, utilizing the 17th-century Grande Colonnade to create a secondary grand entrance near the Seine River. The goal is simple: split the crowd before they ever step inside.
The Real Cost of Subterranean Art Galleries
The cornerstone of the entire renovation is the creation of the underground "Joconde Course," a massive dedicated zone built beneath the Cour Carrée courtyard. This space will give the Mona Lisa its own independent entrance pass. Tourists who only care about checking the portrait off their bucket list can buy a standalone ticket, drop down into the basement, see the painting, and leave without clogging up the rest of the wings.
On paper, it sounds like perfect logistics. In reality, it opens up a massive debate about the nature of art.
Art purists are already pushing back against the idea of isolating the Mona Lisa. For decades, her presence in the Salle des États forced tourists to at least walk past massive, stunning Venetian masterpieces, like Veronese's The Wedding Feast at Cana. By segregating Leonardo's work into an underground bunker, the Louvre risks turning a historic art museum into a single-item theme park ride.
There are also massive technical risks. Building underground exhibition spaces in a centuries-old palace right next to the Seine River is an engineering minefield. The Louvre already deals with persistent water leaks, and digging deeper into the Parisian water table means the winning architects must design an incredibly robust waterproofing and climate-control system. If the humidity levels fluctuate even a fraction of a percent, the 500-year-old poplar panel of the Mona Lisa could warp or crack.
What This Means for Your Next Trip to Paris
This isn't a quick cosmetic paint job. The "Louvre New Renaissance" project is a massive, decade-long undertaking. The official target for completion is 2031, meaning visitors will have to navigate construction barriers, temporary closures, and shifting gallery layouts for years.
The financial ripple effects are already hitting tourists. To help fund the enormous price tag without relying entirely on French taxpayers, the Louvre structured a higher ticket fee for non-EU visitors. If you are traveling from outside Europe, you are paying a premium to subsidize this architectural face-lift.
Museum workers are also pushing back. Louvre staff members recently went on strike, arguing that dropping hundreds of millions of euros on a massive tourist-centric expansion ignores the immediate, day-to-day technical issues plaguing the building. Attendants argue that staff sizes are too small to handle the current pressure, and funding should go toward fixing existing leaks and broken facilities before chasing grand legacy projects.
If you plan to see the Mona Lisa over the next few years, prepare for disruptions. The painting will eventually have to move to a temporary holding room while the new subterranean space is excavated and built. Your best bet is to monitor official Louvre advisories before booking tickets, aim for early morning or late evening time slots, and accept that the peaceful, contemplative viewing experience promised by the museum won't truly exist until the final stones are laid in 2031.
