Luxembourg State Visit to France: March 19-21, 2018


If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.
Status
Not open for further replies.
This visit was planned back in 2016 with President Hollande but was postponed. On a side note the Grand Duchess met Mrs Macron during a private visit last month.
 
Agenda for the state visit

Visite d’État de LL.AA.RR. le Grand-Duc et la Grande-Duchesse en République française — gouvernement.lu // Le gouvernement luxembourgeois

translation
March 19, 2018

The Grand Ducal couple and his delegation will be officially welcomed at Les Invalides in the presence of the French Minister for European Affairs, Nathalie Loiseau. [...]

It is by car that the Grand Ducal couple, accompanied by the large escort of 140 horses and 28 motorcyclists of the motorcycle squadron of the Republican Guard, will be driven to the Elysee Palace.

TRH the Grand Duke and the Grand Duchess will be welcomed by French President Emmanuel Macron and his wife Brigitte Macron for a face-to-face meeting.

The Grand-Ducal couple, the Ministers Étienne Schneider and Pierre Gramegna as well as the Secretary of State to the Minister of Economy and Finance of the French Republic, Delphine Gény-Stephann, will then attend a lunch of senior economic and at an economic forum entitled "France-Luxembourg: More than neighbors". [...]

At the end of the afternoon, the Grand-Ducal couple will be welcomed for an interview at the Hôtel de Lassay by the President of the National Assembly, François de Rugy, in the presence of Minister Jean Asselborn.

A gala dinner offered in honor of LL.AA.RR. the Grand Duke and the Grand Duchess at the Élysée Palace by the President of the French Republic, Emmanuel Macron, and his wife Brigitte Macron will close this first day of the state visit. [...]

March 20, 2018

In the early morning, LL.AA.RR. the Grand Duke and the Grand Duchess will go for an interview at the Hotel du Luxembourg to meet the President of the Senate, Gérard Larcher, in the presence of Minister Jean Asselborn.

The Grand-Ducal couple will then attend a reception at the Paris City Hall, followed by an interview with the Mayor of Paris, Anne Hidalgo, in the presence of Minister Jean Asselborn. This meeting will be followed by the signing of a memorial parchment and the exchange of gifts. The grand-ducal couple will also have the opportunity to greet the guests and the Luxembourg community in Paris.

[...]

The intergovernmental seminar will be followed by a luncheon hosted in the Council Chamber in Matignon by the French Prime Minister, Édouard Philippe, in honor of LL.AA.RR. the Grand Duke and the Grand Duchess [...]

At Station F, a start-up incubator set up in a former railway building, the Head of State and his wife, accompanied by Ministers Xavier Bettel, Étienne Schneider and Pierre Gramegna, will have the opportunity to meet with entrepreneurs on the ShareIT.io acceleration program, whose objective is to help social and environmental entrepreneurs to develop technological projects to build solutions that address societal challenges. They will meet, among others, officials of the NGO We are not Weapons of War and the association Hackers Against Natural Disaster.

The Rodin museum will be used as part of the exhibition "Steichen / Rodin: a dialogue", which is above all the reflection of a beautiful story of friendship between two men, an American of Luxembourg origin and a French, in the capital of contemporary art in the early 20th century. The grand-ducal couple and the wife of the French head of state will attend a guided tour. After the visit, LL.AA.RR. the Grand Duke and the Grand Duchess will give a reception dinner in the gardens of the museum.

March 21, 2018

The last day of the state visit, LL.AA.RR. the Grand Duke and the Grand Duchess and the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of the Economy, Étienne Schneider, will pay a visit to Toulouse. [...]

The official delegation will first visit the National Center for Space Studies (CNES) to visit, among others, the French Instrument Mars Operation Center (FIMOC), a center for French instrument operations for the Mars mission. [...]

It is at the Toulouse town hall, located on Capitol Square, that the grand ducal couple and the ministers will be welcomed by the mayor of Toulouse and president of Toulouse metropolis, Jean-Luc Moudenc. After an interview, they will have the opportunity to visit the magnificent Hall of Illustrious whose paintings retrace the history of the city and meet with Luxembourg nationals and local authorities.

After an official lunch hosted by the prefect of the Occitan region and prefect of Haute-Garonne, Pascal Mailhos, at the prefecture hotel, LL.AA.RR. the Grand Duke and the Grand Duchess and their delegation will visit the Quai des savoirs, [...] They will visit the exhibition "#HumainDemain", which informs and makes its visitors aware of the issues and impacts of scientific and technological innovations on their daily lives and those of future generations.

This state visit will end in the late afternoon with the visit of the company Airbus. [...]
 
Interesting agenda.
As far i can see The Grand Duc and the Grand Duchess will have the "small" procession (Invalides to Elysée) instead of the full grand Welcome at the Arc de Triomphe (albeit rarely used, only for Elizabeth II and Felipe during the last administration).
Wonder if the State Dinner will be black tie again (business suit since 2009). It's the first royal state visit of the Macron administration after all ...
 
.

And today, March 19, the state visit has started with a welcome ceremony at the Élysée Palace in Paris:


** gettyimages gallery: Official Visit OF Grand-Duc Henri Of Luxembourg and Grande-Duchesse Maria Teresa Of Luxembourg : Day Two **

There was a way more formal ceremony at the Invalides, with a military welcome and a Republican guards procession to the Elysée palace. Didn't find any picture yet ...

More pics of the welcome + meeting at the Elysée Palace, from the Grand ducal court website.

Visite d'État en France - Première journée - Cour Grand-Ducale de Luxembourg - Mars 2018

Quite a warm welcome i must say...
 
Last edited by a moderator:
More pics of the welcome + meeting at the Elysée Palace, from the Grand ducal court website.

Visite d'État en France - Première journée - Cour Grand-Ducale de Luxembourg - Mars 2018

Quite a warm welcome i must say...

Very stylish. Better than "Monsieur Normal" in his wrinkled polyester suit.
Both the grand-ducal and presidential couples looked very stylish. Very nice from the President and Madame to meet the Luxembourgian guests halfway the Cour d'Honneur and not remain waiting at the stairs of the Élysée.

:flowers:
 
And here's the picture i was looking for : the impressive state procession from the Invalides to the Elysée palace :

http://images.newmedia.lu/rtl.lu/cm...5//1024//00a8588c587b4fa30b725c2a4da3a54b.jpg

On a side note Mrs Macron and the Grand Duchess seem definitively quite chummy.

Dress code for the State Dinner : Business suit. Le sigh ...

A little reminder : State Dinner were White tie until 1981, Black tie until 2009 and business suit since then ..
 
Last edited by a moderator:
So.. Women must 'make the effort', the Men need not...
 
So.. Women must 'make the effort', the Men need not...

The excuse for the more casual dress code (at least during the Hollande administration) was to open State Dinners to a wider range of the French civil society. So it was basically business/cocktail attire for everyone. But it led to some awkward situations for the queens of Spain, Sweden and the Netherlands (QEII being graced with the unique black tie/tiara dinner of the whole administration).

So there's a apparently a new dress code " en vigueur" tonight. The most surprising is that it was still "Cocktail dress" for the first state visit of the Macron adminsitration, from Lebanon, back in september.

To be frank, i'm not complaining !
 
Last edited:
Once upon a time the Élysée welcomed distinguished visitors with considerable style, but no longer..

THIS might as well be a dreary 'Conference Centre Rubber Chicken Dinner'...
 
Personally i find the ladies quite elegant tonight !
 
Last edited:
The Grand Duchess wore the present Princess Astrid received when her first Child Princess Josephine Charlotte was born.
 
Yes, for a country with the stature of France this is a pathetic display when hosting a STATE visit.
 
I agree. Why are footballers, actors and singers in black tie at the Festival de Cannes, at the Laureus Awards, at the Césars, the Ballon d'Or and not guests at a State Banquet in the Palais de l'Élysée?

I am curious to learn if the grand-ducal couple will organize a black tie return event, like the Dutch did at the Petit-Palais. (M. Hollande ignored that dresscode anyway).

https://www.koninklijkhuis.nl/binar...eken/frankrijk-maart-2016/contraprestatie.jpg
 
Last edited:
I agree. Why are footballers, actors and singers in black tie at the Festival de Cannes, at the Laureus Awards, at the Césars, the Ballon d'Or and not guests at a State Banquet in the Palais de l'Élysée?

I am curious to learn if the grand-ducal couple will organize a black tie return event, like the Dutch did at the Petit-Palais. (M. Hollande ignored that dresscode anyway).

Not a return dinner so to speak but a cocktail party in the gardens of the Rodin Museum.


It was an embarrassment, if not borderline rude : he stayed only for 15 minutes !
 
Last edited:
Yes, for a country with the stature of France this is a pathetic display when hosting a STATE visit.

To be fair: it was already downsized under Chirac (black tie), furtherer downsized by Sarkozy (business suit). One could not expect the socialist Hollande to return to black tie.

Macron already is nicknamed Jupiter for his studied grandesse. He has clearly upped, like the ceremony at Les Invalides and the long dresses for ladies. Let us give some credit. The anti-establishment media can be merciless when Jupiter becomes Dieu (in their eyes)....
 
Last edited:
Last edited:
That rug... :ohmy: so ugly.

It's an expensive woolen carpet by the Savonnerie manufacture, part of a project of Mrs Macron to show French modern design at the Elysée palace.
 
Thanks Nico. Ah...well, I appreciate Mrs. Macron's efforts even though I dislike the look.
 
Thanks for the link!:flowers:
French military uniform, especially upper ranks, is the best in Europe.

I agree. And very recognizeably French also.

It was no dresscode cravate-noire (smoking) but I saw lot of guests with a black suit and black tie, like President Macron. In this way it is not distracting. Actually it was the Grand-Duke with his ugly striped tie whom was off-key next to his glamorous spouse: picture.

We saw it earlier with the Chinese State Visit to Amsterdam. The Chinese guests did not follow the dresscode cravate-blanche (white tie) but by wearing black, they did not clash with the non-Chinese attendants at the banquet, it all looked uniform and stylish: picture.

My recommendation would be, if no cravate-noire is set as dresscode: "Gentlemen in black suit with black tie".
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top Bottom