4 Best Sights in The French Riviera, France

A block west of Rue Clémenceau, in a pretty house at the end of a typically Tropezien lane, the Butterfly Museum is a delightful place to spend an afternoon. Sweetly aflutter, the 35,000 specimens were a passion of late collector Dany Lartigue, the son of the famous photographer Jacques-Henri.

The only museum of culinary art in France is a shrine to the great chef Auguste Escoffier (1846–1935). The epitome of 19th-century culinary extravagance and revered by the French as much as Joan of Arc and De Gaulle, Escoffier was the founding father of the school of haute cuisine Calvin Trillin calls "stuff-stuff-with-heavy," where ingredients are stripped, simmered, stuffed, sauced, and generally intervened with, sometimes beyond recognition. His was the school of food as sculpture—the famous pièces montées, wedding-cake spires of spun sugar—and menus of staggering length and complexity. He wowed 'em at the Ritz in Paris and the Savoy and Carlton in London and is a point of reference for every modern chef—if only as a foil for rebellion. In his birthplace, you'll view illustrations of his creations and a collection of fantastical menus, including one featuring the meat of zoo animals killed in the war of 1870. There are paid guided tours, as well as English-language audio guides (€3).

The small but excellent Musée de la Faïence has concise audiovisual explanations of the craft and displays a chronology of fine pieces. It is housed in a pretty 18th-century hôtel particulier (private mansion) with a lovely salle de mariage (wedding hall) lined in painted canvas.

With its soaring structure of steel, glass, and teak, the MIP has long been one of the more sleekly spectacular museums along the coast. The contemporary design relies on color-coding to easily trace the 3,000-year history of perfume making (highlights include a fascinating collection of 4,000 antique perfume bottles). Artist contributions, like the "Eye Nose You" project that lets you discover details of the scented body through a photographic lens, add a living dimension to the museum.