Overview
Visiting the Louvre with family and kids? A THATMuse treasure hunt is the perfect way to discover one of the biggest and most important art collections in the world. Discover buried secrets and earn bonus points as you examine famous Louvre icons such as the Mona Lisa and Venus de Milo. Get off the beaten track to some of the museum’s quieter galleries for hidden gems, a welcome relief from the Louvre crowds.
The Louvre has over 35 thousand pieces in the collection, though 80% of visitors go straight to see the Mona Lisa, then leave! A crime, but one easily solved by choosing one of our many specialized themes to send you searching for what you want to see, and amazing treasures you never knew existed!
The idea is simple: compete against each other, or the clock, to photograph your team in front of as many pieces as possible within a given amount of time (90 mins to 2 hrs). A variety of additional THATMuse bonus challenges, from the embarrassing to the illuminating, are embedded in your treasure text, ensuring that hunters read about their treasure — making the hunt educational, fun & interactive!
Themes
Beauty & the Bestiary is our most popular theme for first-time visitors (adults & kids alike) to the Louvre. Bestiary are imaginary creatures such as unicorns, griffins & dragons, but for the purpose of getting hunters to main highlights, it includes Egyptian sphinxes, Roman satyrs, Greek Centaurs. Covering Louvre Icons such as the Mona Lisa, Venus de Milo, Nike of Samothrace, it also includes lesser-visited corners such as the Islamic Collection & the Near Eastern empty quarter for a relief from the crowds. KID-FRIENDLY
This theme is meant for the family who wants to steer clear of the crowds (thus skipping famous Louvre icons), keeping to quieter & more contained corners of the museum so you can focus on scouting out (& sometimes pose as!) your animals. Works included are Northern European painting, Medieval European as well as frilly French sculpture. Please don’t choose this theme if you’d like to see the Mona Lisa, Nike of Samothrace or Venus de Milo. KID-FRIENDLY (may be on hold, depending on whether the Louvre’s still renovating parts of the Richelieu wing)
THATLou goes ghoulish on this search for all things dark & macabre, from a decapitated Goliath to a medieval French skeleton. Don’t let’s leave out Roman Sarcophagi, Dutch Vanitas and Egyptian Mummies! This theme covers a good amount of ground, so it’s not for the faint of heart, but is also KID-FRIENDLY, as was reviewed here. What better way to get their attention than to go for the gore?!?
Prowl about after prancing putti, capturing an impish Eros with his arrow! The Venus de Milo is of course chief to this theme & included are wedding feasts by Italian, French and Northern European painters. It’s frequently customized for Hen and Stag parties, not to mention being good for destination wedding ice breakers, or the romantic newlyweds in Paris on a first anniversary. As it covers a good amount of ground, it’s hard on little legs.
Originally built to celebrate Bastille Day, France’s National Day, this theme focuses nearly exclusively on works by Frenchmen and keeps hunters off the beaten-track for the most part, to lesser-known corners of the museum. You’ll leave having learned about French faience (porcelain), tapestries, Frog kingmakers, monarchs – and their lovers, bien sûr! The only exception is the Mona Lisa – despite being by an Italian, she’s included as she is the face of Gaul Marketing!
A popular choice for corporate titans, organizing an office team-building hunt because it requires a fair amount of strategy. Not particularly family-friendly, as it not only covers extensive ground (thus the need to strategise), it also includes some scandalous French monarchs and their lovers, as well as a fair number of Roman Emperors who we all know could also be shockingly salacious!
Often chosen for Hen Parties and a great hunt for a ladies night out before score tallying over a drink, Ladies at the Louvre covers a good amount of ground, so leave your heels at home! This is a well-balanced hunt between the lesser known quarters as well as including some Louvre Lady Icons, such as Nike of Samothrace and the Mona Lisa. Not ideal for children/impatient hunters as there are long stretches where treasure isn’t found.
Not exactly kid-oriented (as you do have to fly about from wing to wing), this was the first theme we built for a Parisian Expat Blogger event which launched THATLou in 2012. Prancing putti in the sculpture collection, heavenly arc-angels in Italian painting, fluttering Flemish birdies in the Northern European collection, this theme gets you all over the place! (not suitable for short legs, as the Louvre is 8 miles if stretched out!)
Originally built for Thanksgiving, this delicious theme is good for adults who want to take their time on the hunt as it covers a broad swath of the museum, from Dionysus and his bacchanalian retinue to sumptuous 17th C Dutch still lifes, Greek urns to Egyptian funerary friezes sending their dead off with foooooood! As Pernod-Ricard attests, this also makes for a good corporate hunt before an office feast!
This hunt is reserved for school groups, having originally been built for the ENS (France’s equivalent to America’s MIT), although it’s also been used by Palo Alto HS Math trip to Europe as well as other school groups interested in making the connection between Art and Science. If you’re leading a school group, please contact us if this is of interest. This theme requires a longer lead time than others.
Sample clue
THE WEDDING FEAST AT CANA, 1563
Paolo Caliari, aka VERONESE (Verona 1528 – Venice 1588)
16th Century Italian Painting, H6.77M x W9.9M (the biggest painting in the Louvre!)
The Benedictine monks of St Giorgio Maggiore (the Palladian church on the Venetian island of the same name) commissioned Veronese to do this monumental work to decorate their new refectory. Hung at 2.5 meters high, the idea was to give the illusion of extended space. It’s huge — 6 meters by 10 – larger than many Parisian flats! One has to wonder how pure these monks were though, considering the sumptuousness of the 130 fellow diners in this panel. Moreover one wonders how abstinent they were, considering the subject: Christ’s first miracle, when he attended a wedding that was about to run dry, he turned the water to wine, making him everyone’s favorite wedding guest. Filled to the brim with delights, thirty bonus points if you count how many dogs are in this painting and another ten if two of your team get down on all fours and poses like those two dogs in the foreground. And yes this is the room with the highest foot-traffic (80% of 30K people a day!): The Mona Lisa is watching you! Is your pride for sale?
GAME POINTS: 10
Prices
Prices don’t include museum entry tickets.
CLASSIC HUNT: 29€/person
LUXE HUNT: 350€/3 hours for 6 people or fewer, includes extras
GROUP HUNT: contact us for a quote
Extras
THATKid
THATKid is geared to kids of varying ages (from 5 to 13) so one THATKid can be shared between two kids. THATKid is a collection of supplemental exercises for after your hunt. Some require the museum (finding 5 trees in 5 Flemish paintings all in the same room, for instance) while others can be played with later (Michelangelo connect-the-dots, Botticelli spot-the-difference, Mona Lisa sticker puzzle). The idea is to play with treasures kids have seen in the museum from a different angle, taking Louvre treasures with them to a restaurant, on a train ride or at your hotel! This includes an Art History glossary. Kid Packs are automatically offered in Luxe Hunts.
THATKid costs 15€/1 pack, 28€/2 packs, 40€/3 packs
THATRue
THATRue is a street hunt which we have in both the Latin Quarter (3 distinct routes between the Jardin du Luxembourg & St Michel on the Left Bank) and the Marais (3 distinct routes between Place des Vosges & the Pompidou on the Right Bank), all offered in both English and Spanish. One route takes 60 to 90 minutes & can be scheduled to do on your own after your museum hunt. We bring THATRue when we meet you for your museum hunt, but please note THATRue is not sold independently of our museum hunts (we have discontinued our postal/drop off service), unless you have two teams or more and hire us on a luxe-hunt basis. It’s often customized for Hen/Stag/Birthday parties, corporate hunts (the Dutch Embassy sent 70 a-hunting recently) or for school groups (it was originally built for 150 American high school teens who used all three Left Bank routes simultaneously). More THATRue info can be found here.
THATRue costs 20€/1 module, 35€/2 modules, 45€/3 modules
THATRue Harry Potter
THATRue Harry Potter is our newest street hunt, with one key difference: it’s inspired by J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series! Drawing links between Paris & the magical world of the Harry Potter books (& films) this THATRue takes hunters on a 2 hour wander, beginning in the Louvre’s Cour Carrée, and ending at Notre Dame Cathedral. As it starts in the neighbourhood of the Louvre, you’re welcome to do it directly after your THATLou, or to come back another day. Although the Harry Potter THATRue is designed to be inclusive, so that Potterheads and casual fans alike can play (with questions ranging in points and geared to different levels of fandom), please note that at least some basic knowledge of the series is required to be able to answer questions. More THATRue Info can be found here.
THATRue Harry Potter costs 20€ (if sold as a supplement to a museum hunt)
Practical Info
Hours
Opening Hours
Closed Tuesdays, open late Wednesday & Fridays (9 am – 9:45 pm, rooms start closing at 9:15), all other days open 9 am-6 pm (rooms start closing at 5:15)
Hours we recommend
As many don’t know of the late hours on Wednesday & Fridays, the crowds are (relatively!) thinner those afternoon and evenings. With our flexible ticket service you could schedule an afternoon hunt, have dinner in the neighborhood for a museum break and return for a leisurely night wander, perhaps finding remaining treasure as a family, un-competitively! Weekends tend to be more crowded
Tickets
You must buy your tickets online from the Louvre website directly, here, but please only buy them after your hunt has been confirmed (ideally buying them for 30 minutes after our meeting time as explained here). Please note, tickets do sell out, and you need to either print them, or have them available to scan on a mobile, prior to meeting (taking a screenshot of the Louvre’s barcode is advised). Please note that these tickets allow you into the fastest security line (faster than the Museum Passes).
If you’re in Paris for a few days and plan to visit several museums, we’ve also heard wonderful things about the “Paris Museum Pass” which the government tourist board sells here.
Please note that kids under 18 enter free, as do EU Citizens & residents under 26 as long as you bring photo ID. Most ticket booking websites (the Louvre included) will not refund your tickets if you accidentally buy them for the kids, so be sure to only buy the adult tickets you need.
Getting there
Address
75001 Paris, France
Metro
Lines 1 & 7 (Station “Palais Royal – Musée du Louvre”)
Bus Lines
(stop in front of the Pyramid)
21, 24, 27, 39, 48, 68, 69, 72, 81, 95 & Open Top
