Rue Fresnel de l'impasse de Versailles (Rue Fresnel, as seen from the Versailles cul-del-sac)

When professional photographer Charles Marville took this shot of a narrow, winding street in the heart of Old Paris, he knew that this quaint old cobblestoned street was about to disappear forever and that its inhabitants, such as the woman leaning out of the second story window, would likely be relocated elsewhere. A wider, straighter street would soon be cut through the heart of this old neighborhood, and new stone-clad buildings of uniform height and architectural style would be built on the site of these crumbling relics. <
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> Marville had been commissioned by Baron Haussmann to document the neighborhoods of Old Paris that were scheduled for demolition. Marville took more than 400 photographs, which were published in 1865 under the title L’Album du vieux Paris, or Album of Old Paris. Many of Marville’s photographs combine fine archival detail and documentary value with an eerily poetic or lyrical quality.