The Avenue des Champs-Élysées is the most prestigious avenue in Paris. With its cinemas, cafés, and luxury specialty shops, the Avenue des Champs-Élysées is one of the most famous streets in the world, and with rents as high as $1.50 million 1000 square feet (92.9 square meters) of space, it remains the most expensive strip of real estate in Europe.The name is French for Elysian Fields, the place of the blessed, i.e. "heaven" in Greek mythology.
    
     The Avenue des Champs-Élysées is known in France as La plus belle avenue du monde ("The most beautiful avenue in the world"). The arrival of global chain stores in recent years has slightly changed its character, and in a first effort to stem these changes, the Paris City government (which has called this trend "banalisation") decided in 2007 to ban the Swedish clothing chain H&M from opening a store on the avenue In 2008, however, American clothing chain Abercrombie & Fitch was given permission to open a store.