One of the world’s most visited museums will have a new policy. The Louvre in Paris has limited the number of daily guests “in order to facilitate a comfortable visit and ensure optimal working conditions for museum staff.”
According to a statement released Thursday, the museum has lowered the number of daily visitors to 30,000.
Before the pandemic, the Louvre welcomed up to 45,000 visitors each day. Following a 16-week closure, the museum did not change its capacity. However, attendance was down because of the ongoing pandemic and international travel restrictions, Art News reported.
Although the announcement just broke, the decision to limit capacity was made last summer following the announcement of Laurence des Cars becoming the next president-director.
“The extremely positive figures for 2022 are tremendously encouraging for all our staff. I hope that visitors enjoy spending time at the Musée du Louvre, particularly those discovering the museum for the first time, who represent 60% of them. We are working ever harder to improve visiting conditions and to continue to offer a programme of great quality and a unique array of live performances resonating with what’s on at the museum,” des Cars wrote.
At the time of the announcement on daily capacity changes, the museum also announced its attendance for last year, totaling 7.8 million visitors, 120 percent from the previous year. Although attendance is improving, the numbers are down 19 percent from its peak of 9.6 million in 2019.
Of the 7.8 million Louvre visitors last year, 30 percent were French, and 70 percent were foreign visitors. 18% were from the U.S. Notably, visitors from Asia “were practically absent despite a small increase observed at the end of the year,” according to the report.
