Paris - Inspiration of American oil painter Jeff Starr. My interest and love of France really grew after I moved to San Francisco. Of course, I had seen all the romantic movies of lovers strolling on the banks of the Seine at night with the City Of Lights reflecting on the water.

But moving to San Francisco really got me to appreciate the vibe of Paris. I was going to do a painting last year called "Paris Begets San Francisco", a symbolic representation of my view that Paris really gave birth to San Francisco culturally. What both cities share is a love of Art, Food, Music and Laughter. I guess that's really what is meant by 'joie de vivre', and it fits right in to my general outlook.

When I finally got to see Paris in person, I was stunned. It was like San Francisco times 100. All the things I love here were there, and more. The architecture, the food, the art, and just the general mood in the air was lovely. Seeing the Louvre was beyond words, and getting up to Giverny to tour Monet's house was surreal. Walking around his Japanese pond seeing where he painted all of his "Water Lilies" was something I will never forget.

My wife and I seriously considered moving to Paris when we came back home. Things didn't work out at that immediate time, but in the future - who knows?

Paris has many nicknames, but its most famous is 'La Ville-Lumiere' (literally, 'The Light City'; although most often translated as 'The City of Lights' or as 'The City of Light'), a name it owes both to its fame as a centre of education and ideas and its early adoption of street lighting.

The Industrial Revolution, the French Second Empire, and the Belle Epoque brought Paris the greatest development in its history. From the 1840s, rail transport allowed an unprecedented flow of migrants into Paris attracted by employment in the new industries in the suburbs. The city underwent a massive renovation under Napoleon III and his prefet Haussmann, who levelled entire districts of narrow, winding medieval streets to create the network of wide avenues and neo-classical facades of modern Paris. This programme of 'Haussmannisation' was designed to make the city both more beautiful and more sanitary for its inhabitants, although it did have the added benefit that, in case of future revolts or revolutions, cavalry charges and rifle fire could be used to deal with the insurrection, while the rebel tactic of barricading so often used during the Revolution would become obsolete.

Three of the most famous Parisian landmarks are the twelfth-century cathedral Notre Dame de Paris on the Ile de la Cite, the Napoleonic Arc de Triomphe and the nineteenth-century Eiffel Tower. The Eiffel Tower was a 'temporary' construction by Gustave Eiffel for the 1889 Universal Exposition, but the tower was never dismantled and is now an enduring symbol of Paris. The Historical axis is a line of monuments, buildings, and thoroughfares that run in a roughly straight line from the city-centre westwards: The line of monuments begins with the Louvre and continues through the Tuileries Gardens, the Champs-Elysees, and the Arc de Triomphe, centred in the Place de l'Etoile circus.