There is no way that you can talk about the Grand Palais without mentioning the light. With its immense glass roof, the biggest in Europe, the building is a palace dedicated to transparency and light. Over and above the sheer technical achievement and beauty of the building, it was also designed to address practical needs.

When it was built, shortly before 1900, electric lighting was in its infancy. Hence the extensive use of natural light sources: glass roofs (over the VIP lounge and the lateral exhibition galleries) and glass tiles, very much in fashion during the Belle Époque. These were used both as a decorative feature for floors and ceilings and to provide vertical light for lower floors, notably in the rotundas, loggias, and galleries.
 
As soon as the Grand Palais opened, lighting was also artistically featured for night events. Contemporary photographs show how much care was taken in designing illuminations. Each evening had its own décor and lighting, designed to create a sense of inimitable grandeur for guests and visitors during these special moments.

The design of new illuminations for the Grand Palais is a major and ambitious project for the 21st century. The facade on avenue Winston-Churchill with its groups of sculptures, colonnades, pots à feu and other rooftop decorations and ornaments, must be enhanced at nightfall. Currently, only Récipon's quadrigas, the peristyle and the rooftop dome are lit up.
 
However, the terraces, facade with its mosaics facing the street, and monumental door in wrought iron deserve an enhancement that inventive illumination would unquestionably provide. The same applies to the interior of the Nave (balconies, ornaments, steel structure and coiling decoration). Interior light, filtering through the glass roof, would radiate over Paris and be brilliantly visible from afar. Designed and executed by an artist specialised in the use of lighting, the task of illuminating the Grand Palais is an exciting challenge on the scale of the building itself.