Presidential Palace

This French colonial building was originally the living and working headquarters for the Governor General of Indochina. After Vietnam's defeat of the French in 1954, Ho Chi Minh refused to live here, preferring instead the modest cottage on the Palace's grounds (from 1954 to 1958). In 1958, he moved into the house on stilts.

This bright mustard building, though a French colonial building, bears a resemblance to Italianate Renaissance and Baroque palaces. The second floor (the piano nobile) is the important formal floor with a grand stairway leading to the arched portal. Quoins, broken pediments, elaborate columns, and aedicules with balustrades are common in architecture of the 16th and 17th century in Italy.