Bercy Village

This guide to Bercy Village in Paris traces how a royal tax exemption from Louis XIV turned this bend of the Seine into the largest wine market in the world, and how the Paris-Lyon railway, arriving in 1847, scaled the trade up with specialised wagons rolling barrels straight into the warehouses. It follows the guinguettes, the open-air bars that made the district famous as Joyeux-Bercy, and the tax-free nights that drew Parisians out here. Look down at the old rails still set in the cobblestones as you walk between the shops.