Or - and hear me out - it holds the beautiful, challenging Centre Georges Pompidou, which is exactly the same as in our timeline, but people don't despise it because it wasn't made of Bath stone in a boring Regency pastiche or, worse, an equally uninspired attempt at replicating Versailles.

"The Centre Pompidou Is Good Actually" is not the weirdest hill I am willing to die on, but it's up there. =]

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"She's old, she's lame, she's barren too, // "She's not worth feed or hay, // "But I'll give her this," - he blew smoke at me - // "She was something in her day." -- Garnet Rogers, Small Victory

FiMFiction.net: we might accept blatant porn involving the cast of My Little Pony but as God is my witness we have standards.

Paris is a big city. There's space in it for buildings that are interesting.