Nice celebrates 200 years of its Promenade des Anglais which runs along the Mediterranean

Named in 1824 during its inauguration the "Strada del littorale", when the county of Nice was an integral part of the kingdom of Sardinia, it was quickly designated by the locals, in their Nissart dialect, the "camin dei Inglés" (path of the English).

It was in fact an Englishman, the Anglican pastor Lewis Way, who took the initiative in 1822 to launch a subscription among his compatriots linked to the city to help the people of Nice who were out of work due to poor harvests. The inhabitants in poverty were able to be employed to level a first two-metre wide causeway along the coast.

From the middle of the 18th century, in this town at the foot of the Alps, where the sea was seen as a danger and fishing was not so fruitful due to the depth of the sea, wealthy Englishmen took to coming to enjoy the mild winter.

The purpose of this promenade, as its name suggests, was not so much to lead from one point to another as to allow people to stroll along the Bay of Angels while contemplating the Mediterranean, also in search of therapeutic benefits.

In the decades that followed, with the development of winter tourism, then summer tourism from the 1860th century, and the annexation of Nice to France in XNUMX, the promenade gradually took on its current appearance with a wide sidewalk equipped with blue chairs and a roadway lined with palm trees, palaces and casinos at the foot of the pebble beaches.

The architectural wealth along the promenade bears witness to the evolution of a city dedicated to winter climatic resorts, a wealth which earned it a UNESCO heritage classification in 2021.

All weekend long, the public will be able to discover the history of what is locally called the "Prom'" through photographic exhibitions, take part in artistic strolls and immersive experiences or share a giant birthday cake, not without paying tribute, at the Palais de la Méditerranée, a masterpiece of Art Deco, to the 86 victims of the Nice attack, at the very spot where the truck race driven by a thirty-year-old Tunisian living in Nice and radicalized had been stopped on July 14, 2016.