Hôtel de Soissons [SEP] architect
Hôtel de Soissons
The Hôtel de Soissons was a "hôtel particulier" (grand house) built in Paris, France, between 1574 and 1584 for Catherine de' Medici (1519–89) by the architect Jean Bullant (1515–78).
It replaced a series of earlier buildings on the same site. After Catherine's death the hotel was enlarged and embellished. The last owner, Victor Amadeus I, Prince of Carignano, installed the Paris Bourse in the gardens, He was forced to sell it in 1740 to pay his
Bullant replaced him as Catherine's chief architect. In 1572, Catherine commissioned Bullant to build a new home for her within the Paris city walls. She had outgrown her apartments at the Louvre and needed more room for her swelling household. To make space for the new scheme and its gardens, she had an entire area of Paris demolished. 
The new palace was known in Catherine's time as the Hôtel de la Reine and later as the Hôtel de Soissons. Engravings made by Israël Silvestre in about 1650 and a plan