The building, an architectural heritage

Mirroring the construction of the Oceanographic Museum of Monaco, Prince Albert I wished to establish in Paris a centre for oceanographic studies combining research and teaching. Here he created his Foundation, the Oceanographic Institute, whose founding charter was signed in the Principality on 14 April 1906. On 16 May, the President of the French Republic, Armand Fallières, signed the decree recognising the Oceanographic Institute as a foundation of public utility.

To build the new Sorbonne, the University of Paris acquired the convent of the Dames de Saint-Michel on rue Saint-Jacques, with the support of the French State, the City of Paris and Prince Albert I. In gratitude, the University granted him a plot of land on which to build his institute. Their proximity would make exchanges between the two institutions easier.

Prince Albert I entrusted the construction of his institute to the architect Henri-Paul Nénot, assisted by several artists in charge of its ornamentation. Work began in 1908 and was completed in 1911.

To publish the findings of oceanographic research, the Annales de l’Institut océanographique were founded in 1909 under the patronage of Prince Albert I and the direction of Louis Joubin, then professor at the National Museum of Natural History and at the Oceanographic Institute. The journal ran until 2002.

The Oceanographic Institute opened its doors on 23 January, in the heart of academic Paris. Entrusted to Henri-Paul Nénot, also the architect of the Sorbonne, the building had taken shape in Prince Albert I’s mind as his expeditions met with success. A mirror of the Monaco museum inaugurated with great ceremony a year earlier, it set in stone the Foundation recognised as being of public utility since 1906. The first lectures in the great amphitheatre drew large crowds.

Prince Albert I wanted to encourage the sharing of knowledge through lectures in which researchers presented their findings to the general public. Edmond Perrier, then director of the National Museum of Natural History, launched the series with a talk on “The Origin of Abyssal Faunas”.

Charles Richet received the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his research on anaphylaxis. The award crowned work carried out with Paul Portier, who held the chair of physiology of marine organisms at the Oceanographic Institute. The two men had begun working together in 1902, during one of Prince Albert I’s oceanographic campaigns off Cape Verde and the Azores.

Founded a few years earlier at the instigation of Prince Albert I, the International Commission for the Scientific Exploration of the Mediterranean made the Oceanographic Institute its home. The building quickly became a key venue for scientific diplomacy, with a prolific publishing output. The Institute also made its mark on Parisian life: Jean Painlevé, a pioneer of underwater film, screened several of his works here, while the small and great amphitheatres became available to hire.

The Occupation did not spare the Oceanographic Institute: deprived of staff and equipment, research came to a halt. After the war, Jacques-Yves Cousteau’s first lecture — on diving and underwater photography in the service of oceanography — signalled a rebirth. From 1957 until 1997, the famous Commandant presented his discoveries and explorations to audiences in the great amphitheatre once a year. The Calypso and its scientific adventures went on to captivate the world.

Created in 1948 by the patron Nicolas Bendall Manley to mark the centenary of the Prince’s birth, the Grande Médaille Albert I^er was awarded for the first time in 1949, to Professor Hans Pettersson. Every year since, without interruption, the Oceanographic Institute has honoured figures from the world of the sea for their scientific discoveries and their commitment. Introduced in 2014, the Mediation category recognises the work of women and men in public life.

The Oceanographic Institute operated as a genuine centre for research and higher education, with three major laboratories, each with its own speciality: the physical properties of the ocean, marine biology, and the physiology of marine organisms. Their work appeared in the house journal of record, the Annales de l’Institut océanographique, published since 1909. Among thousands of volumes, the complete collection was at the time freely available to students and scientists on the third floor of the library — formerly the director’s drawing room.

As the first issue of the journal Oceanis appeared, the Oceanographic Institute’s educational vocation took shape with the opening of a Centre de la mer et des eaux in its basement. The exhibition space offered fifteen aquariums, temporary exhibitions, Commandant Cousteau’s films and information panels on maritime professions. With its touchscreens, it foreshadowed the opening of the Cité des sciences and was an immediate public success, drawing 55,000 visitors a year. Its bookshop, Le Comptoir de la Mer, complemented a continually updated media library.

The scientific and academic activity of the three historic laboratories gradually wound down through the 1980s. Listed as a Monument Historique in 2004, the Oceanographic Institute completed its transformation into a place of heritage and transmission. Reimagined as a networking platform for its centenary in 2011, the Institute has become a genuine environmental hub, welcoming the major institutions of ocean protection under its roof.

For the building’s centenary, the Oceanographic Institute was renamed the Maison de l’Océan.