The Salle de la Lune: When the Sun and Moon Swapped Places

The ceiling of the Salle de la Lune, or Moon Room, shows a round silver moon, and in the center are an owl and a bat, creatures of the night. It gives the room a slightly eerie feel.

Yet this room was originally designed to be the Sun Room, not the Moon Room. A smoking room, where the emperor and the public could smoke, was planned right next door, and since this room was close to it, the plan was to put the Sun Room here to give it a hot atmosphere. But the workers made a mistake, and the Sun Room and Moon Room ended up swapped. On top of that, Napoleon III was deposed and construction stopped, so the smoking room was never built at all.