Paris, with such a rich cultural heritage, has plenty of great sights. Sure, you gotta see the Louvre and the Orsay, but here are three of my favorites that aren’t on everyone’s list.

The Cluny Museum fills a medieval mansion that’s actually built upon an ancient Roman bath. Its forte is Paris in the late Middle Ages, offering a delightful peek into the art of that so often underappreciated age. The sumptuous ivory pieces…vibrant enamel work…and gorgeous sculptures reflect a surprisingly refined society.

The centerpiece is a 15th-century series of tapestries called “The Lady and the Unicorn.” In medieval lore, unicorns were solitary creatures that could only be tamed by a virgin. These exquisite tapestries give us a peek at life—sensual life—from a time when the people of Paris were just stepping out of medieval darkness. It’s sexy, a celebration of all the senses: sight…taste…smell…sound…and touch.

Nearby is another low-key highlight of Paris. If you like sculpture and if you like Impressionism, don’t miss the Rodin Museum. Auguste Rodin was a modern Michelangelo. He sculpted human figures with powerful insight, revealing, through the body, their deepest emotions.

Here, his “Hand of God” shapes Adam and Eve from the mud of the Earth, to which they will return. In “The Kiss,” a passionate woman twines around her solid man, surrendering to the power of love with their first kiss. We can almost read the emotions that led up to this meeting of the lips. This was the first work by Rodin that the public loved.

Rodin enjoyed his garden—as do visitors today. They find it a place for peaceful meditation a century after the artist last planted a statue here. He sculpted the famous “Thinker” in 1906. Leaning slightly forward, tense and compact, with every muscle working toward producing that one great thought, man contemplates his fate.

And finally, here in the king’s back yard, behind the palace, is a royal indoor garden called the Orangerie.

While the Orangerie no longer contains plants, today it’s filled with a garden of Impressionist and early-20th-century paintings—select works by Renoir…by Cézanne…by Gaugin…and others.

And its main attraction is Monet’s “Water Lilies,” floating dreamily in the oval rooms the artist himself designed to showcase his masterpiece. This series of expansive, curved panels is the epitome of Impressionism. It immerses you in Monet’s garden. We’re looking into his pond—dotted with water lilies and dappled by the reflections of the sky, clouds, and trees on the surface. Monet mingles the pond’s many elements and then lets us sort it out. The true subject of these works is not the pond itself. It’s the play of light reflecting off the water. Sublime and tranquil, Monet intended this to be a place of reflection.

Of course there’s no way to cover all the delights of Paris in just an hour. The more you know about this city, the more you appreciate its huge range of attractions:

You’ll find mansions like Jacquemart-André, where a fabulously rich couple lived in unthinkable luxury while patronizing the arts.

There are museums, like Quai Branly—working to celebrate societies in the Global South and give dignity to cultures beyond Europe.

There’s Père Lachaise Cemetery, my vote for the most romantic graveyard in all of Europe—eternal home for the mortal remains of permanent Parisians from Chopin to Oscar Wilde.

Or, for the nameless dead, there’s the Catacombs: a mile-long series of tunnels filled with the bones of literally millions of Parisians who once filled its graveyards.

And the business district, La Défense…where Parisians live, work, and rarely see a tourist and you’ll find great public art, some of which makes you feel very small in such a big, big city.