Musée Rodin

Forget the Hôtel Biron — this is where Rodin actually lived and worked. The Musée Rodin in Meudon, perched on the heights south of Paris, gives you something the central Paris site can't: a real sense of the artist's daily life. The visit starts at the Villa des Brillants, Rodin's home for his last 20 years, reconstructed from period photographs in 1997. You walk through the dining room, drawing room, and sculpture studio, and you can feel the domestic intimacy that shaped his late work.

The highlight is the plaster gallery — a long glass-walled space filled with casts of Rodin's major sculptures, including the Burghers of Calais, the Gates of Hell, and Balzac, all in their raw, unfinished-looking plaster state. It's a completely different experience from seeing the polished bronzes in Paris. There's also a tactile gallery where you can actually touch resin reproductions of his works, which makes this one of the rare museums where hands-on isn't just tolerated but encouraged.

The park is free and peaceful — reviewers consistently praise the calm, green setting. The big catch: it's only open on weekends, 10am to 6pm, and only through the end of September. That limited schedule is the most common complaint in reviews. But if you can time it right, you'll get a far more personal, far less crowded Rodin experience than anything in central Paris.