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Putting the “A" in Alliance - NATO Headquarters Porte Dauphine

In February 1952, the North Atlantic Council decided to establish the permanent Headquarters of NATO in Paris.

When the French government offered land on the edge of the motorway to Mantes, approximately seven kilometres away from SHAPE in November 1952, certain delegations objected because of the distance from the centre of Paris. Two years later, in April 1954, France placed at the disposal of NATO a plot of land of 16,000 square metres at the Place de la Porte Dauphine in Paris, at one end of the Avenue Foch and adjoining the Bois de Boulogne.

The French architect Jacques Carlu, who designed the Palais de Chaillot in Paris, was nominated to draw the plans of NATO’s future headquarters. The building was financed by NATO members and built under the direct supervision of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.

Six years later, in early 1960, NATO was transferred to its new headquarters, Porte Dauphine.