The Hôtel de Lamoignon, earlier the Hôtel d'Angoulême, is a late 16th-century hôtel particulier, or grand townhouse, in the Marais district of the 4th arrondissement of Paris, France. It is the best preserved house from this period in Paris. Since 1969 it has been the home of the Bibliothèque Historique de la Ville de Paris and its garden, Hôtel-Lamoignon - Mark Ashton Garden, is opened to the public. History and description The lot of the hôtel is located outside the limits of medieval Paris, north of the wall of Philip Augustus. In the second quarter of the 16th century, under the influence of Francis I, the royal Hôtel Saint-Pol and its gardens were divided into lots, and, after 1543, constructed upon. A vigorous movement of construction of hôtels particuliers and wealthy townhouses followed in the Saint-Paul quarter, which set up the Marais as the most favoured Parisian neighbourhood by the high nobility. Construction by Diane de France Diane de France, legitimised daughter of Henry II of France and his young mistress Filippa Duci, was created Duchess of Angoulême in 1582. Her new title brought with it considerable wealth, and, when in 1584 she inherited a large lot near the intersection of the rue des Francs-Bourgeois and the rue Pavée in the Marais district, she decided to use it as the location of her main urban residence. Construction of the Hôtel d'Angoulême began in 1584, but was likely interrupted by the Wars of Religion, and only completed by a second phase of construction in 1611. Its architect is still uncertain: long attributed to Baptiste Androuet du Cerceau on stylistic grounds, an archival discovery of 1984 led some historians to name Louis Métezeau as the architect. It is now suggested that Louis' father, Thibault Métezeau, more likely designed it. Another hypothesis suggests Philibert Delorme built the hôtel a little earlier in the century. The house stood between its entrance courtyard to the west and its garden to the east, a layout reminiscent of a small château. The courtyard facade, richly ornamented and precisely designed, comprised a corps de logis four storeys in height with five bays and two end pavilions. It is the only part of the house to survive more or less at it was originally built. The hôtel was among the first in France to use Corinthian pilasters based on the writings of Vitruvius, translated in 1567, a few years