The Grande Loge de France is housed in a former Franciscan convent behind the Batignolles, bought in 1911, on a street few Parisians could point to. It is not open to walk-in visitors. The lodge rooms themselves never are. The museum inside it is, on two afternoons a week, with a guide, if you book.
That is the useful fact, and the rest of the reading makes more sense after it. The obedience in its present form dates from 1894, though the original body goes back to 1738. It works the Rite écossais ancien et accepté, and only in the first three degrees. It is not the Grand Orient de France and it is not the Grande Loge Nationale Française. It holds an intermediate position between the two and keeps friendly relations with most French obediences. In this world that is a diplomatic achievement rather than an obvious one. It counted 8,400 members in 149 lodges in 1912 and 25,000 members in 640 lodges in 1998.
The Musée de la Grande Loge de France
Visits run on Wednesdays from 11:00 to 12:30 and again from 14:00 to 15:30, and on Fridays from 14:00 to 15:30. Reservation is compulsory. Unguided visits are not offered at all, so there is no wandering in on the way past. The museum is also shut at weekends and on public holidays, which is precisely when a visitor is free. Plan it into a weekday.
Individual admission is 7 euros full price and 5 euros reduced. Groups pay 12 euros full price and 10 euros reduced, and a group means between 10 and 25 people, so a family is an individual booking.
Musée de la Grande Loge de France: 8 rue Louis Puteaux, 75017 Paris, Tel. 01 53 42 61 83, gldf.org. Métro Rome on line 2, or Place de Clichy on line 13
The weekend the building opens
Once a year the doors come off the hinges. The Hôtel de la Grande Loge de France takes part in the Journées européennes du patrimoine on 19 and 20 September 2026, with public lectures by Dominique Losay on the Saturday and Clément Ledoux on the Sunday, each from 14:30 to 16:30. If your trip can be moved to that weekend, move it. It is the one occasion when the building rather than its museum is the thing you see.
The Musée de la Franc-Maçonnerie
The other collection belongs to the Grand Orient de France. It behaves like a normal museum. No guide required, no reservation, and it opens every day but Monday. Full price is 8 euros and reduced is 5 euros, with free entry for the under-18s. For a visitor with one afternoon and no plans, this is the one to choose, and the rue Cadet building is a short walk from the Grands Boulevards.
Musée de la Franc-Maçonnerie: 16 rue Cadet, 75009 Paris, Tel. 01 45 23 74 09, museefm.org. Tuesday to Friday 10:00 to 12:30 and 14:00 to 18:00, Saturday 10:00 to 13:00 and 14:00 to 19:00, Sunday 10:00 to 12:30 and 14:00 to 18:00, closed Mondays and public holidays. Métro Cadet on line 7, or Grands Boulevards on lines 8 and 9
Related: Palais Royal, Paris
One piece of advice the guides do not give. Do the two in the wrong order. Rue Cadet first, unguided, at your own pace, until the vocabulary and the objects are familiar. Then rue Louis Puteaux on a Wednesday, with a guide who assumes a tracing board needs no introduction. Done the other way round, the guided hour is spent on definitions. And if the afternoon collapses, Les Puces and the Palais Garnier are both open when these are not.