Bourse du Commerce - Paris

The French Commodities Exchange, La Bourse du Commerce is a round building built in the 18th century, and later modified in the 19th. The site however has been occupied for the last 800 years. Called the Hôtel de Nesle, during the 13th century, then it became the Hôtel de Bohème, then Hôtel de Orléans. The mother of St. Louis, Blanche de Castille, died in the Hôtel de Nesle in 1252. Later, Louis XII lost the building to his chamberlain in a cribbage game. He in turn converted it to a convent for wayward women. In 1572, Catherine de Medici moved the convent out, and had Delorme and Bullant construct the Hôtel de la Reine, later called the Hôtel de Savoy. The present rotunda built in 1889 replaced a wheat market build during Louis XVI's reign.