Rue Saint-Florentin was originally a cul-de-sac named "cul-de-sac de l'Orangerie". In 1730, part of the land bordering it (corresponding to the odd numbers) belonged to Louis XV and the other part (corresponding to the even numbers) to financier Samuel Bernard.
In 1758, when the Place de la Concorde was created, the impasse became "rue de l'Orangerie". It was also known as "petite rue des Tuileries".
It begins between 2, place de la Concorde and 258, rue de Rivoli. It ends at 271, rue Saint-Honoré, where it is extended by rue du Chevalier-de-Saint-George. The even-numbered side is in the 1st arrondissement, while the odd-numbered side is in the 8th arrondissement.
On the south east side the street is bordered by the Hôtel Saint-Florentin (also known as Hôtel de l'Infantado and "Hôtel de Talleyrand-Périgord".
Nos. 6-8: buildings constructed for personal use by Jacques-Guillaume Legrand and Jacques Molinos in 1789. On the façade, capitals bear the associated figures, "LM", of the two architects and casts of the Innocents fountain at no. 6, whose dismantling Legrand and Molinos had supervised. In the building, they founded the Musée de l'Ordre Dorique, which featured a scale reproduction of two Parthenon columns in one of the two courtyards.
No. 7: Hôtel Le Maître, built by Louis Le Tellier in 1768. Adélaïde de Souza, a woman of letters and mother of Charles, comte de Flahaut and a son of Talleyrand, lived in this hotel from 1829. The hotel was home to Ferdinand de Lesseps. In 1914, couturier Jean Patou opened his haute couture house here and, in 1921, commissioned decorator architect Louis Süe to make alterations. Today, it houses the offices of the French Human Rights Ombudsman.
No. 9: Hôtel de Ségur, built by Louis Le Tellier in 1768. The general and historian Philippe Paul, comte de Ségur lived here at the beginning of the First Empire. Under the July Monarchy, the hotel was occupied by General Baudrand (1774-1848), peer de France. Prince Józef Michał Poniatowski, an opera singer lived here during the Second Empire. Misia Sert and Thadée Natanson lived at this address after their marriage in 1893, until their divorce in 1905.[18] In 1910, it belonged to the Marquis de Las Cases.
No. 11: Hôtel de Chiverny, built in 1702, rebuilt in 1767 for Jean-Baptiste Bersin. It belonged to his daughter Claude Angélique Bersin, married in 1747 to Marquis Anne Emmanuel de Crussol d'Ambroise. Charles, marquis de La Valette, Minister of Foreign Affairs under the Second Empire, lived and died here.
No. 13: in 1830-1833 inhabited by James Fenimore Cooper.[19] In 1910 by Gaston Jollivet (1842-1927), man of letters, and Victor de Cottens (1862-1956). playwright.