Wine tasting at Les Caves du Louvre

Les Caves du Louvre is a wine centre in the cellars of 52 rue de l'Arbre Sec, in the 1st arrondissement, a street away from the Louvre and beside La Samaritaine. The house above was built for André Eynaud, one of the 25 wine merchants with access to the court of Louis XV, the operator says, and later passed to Jacques-François Trudon, heir to the royal wax works that made the candles for the Louvre and Versailles, who kept wine in these cellars. The operator says its street façade has been a listed historic monument since 1925. Fever describes 600 square metres of vaulted cellars; the operator's own site gives 800.

The visit Fever sells is the premium guided tour. You choose an English or a French session when you book, and a sommelier takes you through the cellars for about an hour. Fever and the operator describe it as a walk through the rooms with three wines tasted along the way, from what Fever calls pleasure wines and award-winning, popular producers. The operator lists the subjects: how to taste with all five senses, the main French grape varieties and where they grow, terroir, aromas and primary flavours, how wine is made and bottled, how to read a label, cork against screw cap, how to tell a wine's age, and five rules for matching wine with food. Questions are part of the format.

The cellars are fitted out as a series of rooms rather than a bare cave: Fever's photographs show a lit corridor of vine roots in glass, a sensory room with scent stations, a long marble tasting bar with spittoons under a vaulted wooden ceiling and a hexagonal bottle wall. It is meant for beginners and curious drinkers more than experts, and the operator says so: no jargon, wine for everyone.

On 30 October 2026 Fever listed sessions from 14:00 to 18:15 that day and dates on sale to 30 April 2027. Everyone must be 18 or over and carry valid ID, Fever says, and the cellars have no step-free access.

This is the wine tasting we would book in Paris for a first-timer with an hour to spare: it holds 4.53 from 1,205 reviews on Fever on 30 October 2026, it runs in English in the afternoon, and the setting, cellars under a listed house used by a wine merchant to Louis XV's court, is half the point. It is also central: Hôtel Madame Rêve is about 7 minutes away on foot, and the Louvre is around the corner, so it fits between a museum morning and dinner.

Its nearest rival is Ô Chateau, a wine bar and restaurant near the Louvre, whose English Tour de France des Vins pours six wines over two hours at 17:00 for 75 euros on its own site on 30 October 2026: more wine and more time, at a higher price, in a bar rather than a cellar. On Fever itself, the other Paris wine tastings we could read that day were small: Wine Tasting In Paris, in the 5th arrondissement, 75 euros with 5.0 from only 2 reviews, and a tasting near Père Lachaise at 45 euros with no rating yet. Choose Les Caves du Louvre for the place and a short, guided introduction; choose Ô Chateau for a longer tasting with more bottles.

Buying on Fever costs the same as buying direct: the operator's own site sells the same Guided Tour with Premium Tasting at 50 euros, and Fever adds no booking fee. The operator also sells a Classic version with discovery wines for 36 euros and an Ultimate Wine and Cheese Tasting, ten wines and ten cheeses over two hours, for 109 euros, which Fever did not list on 30 October 2026; book those direct. If you would rather sit for an hour of music, see our Candlelight concerts in Paris page, with concerts in the Eiffel Tower's first-floor salon and at Maison de l'Océan; for history on foot, Les Origines de Paris is a guided virtual reality walk along the Seine from under Pont Louis-Philippe.