For Parisians there is no more sacred space in the history of their city than Les Halles, the old central market at the heart of the Right Bank, near the Seine to the south and the Grands Boulevards to the north. A market has stood here in one form or another since the 12th century, when dockers heaved wine, meat and other goods from the barges that regularly queued up the Seine. The area was first known as Les Champeaux but got its nickname Les Halles because chacun y allait (“everybody went there”). It reached its apogee in the 19th century, when it was celebrated by Émile Zola as the very “belly of Paris”. During this period, the market sprawled over nearly a square mile, covered by wrought-iron pavillons or “umbrellas” designed by Victor Baltard that formed a stinking labyrinth that was a knacker’s yard, an open-air brothel and the greatest food market in Europe, all at once.

These days, far from being the vibrant centre of the French capital, Les Halles has become a byword for everything that is wrong with contemporary city life. The site of the old market is now a shabby and decaying shopping mall, which penetrates deep underground into a metro and train station. The uninspired architecture isn’t the only thing that has upset Parisians, however. It’s also the neighbourhood – and its crime rate. In recent years, the shopping mall at the centre of the area, called Forum Les Halles, and its surrounding streets have become the adopted home of a floating community of banlieusards – youths from the tough suburbs of Paris.