Living in Saint-Etienne

Officially labelled “town of art and history”, today Saint-Étienne is the only French city ranked as one of the “UNESCO’s city of design”.
With a strong and dynamic student life (over 25,000 students – Ecole des Mines, Ecole d’Architecture, Ecole Supérieure d’Art et de Design, Télécom, ENISE …), Saint-Étienne offers a wide range of cultural infrastructures and events: the first contemporary art collection after Beaubourg, a Zénith arena, a SMAC (contemporary music scene) called Le Fil, one opera house and a theater, numerous festivals and the international design biennial gathering more than 100,000 visitors from all over the world.

With its sport infrastructures, its student life, its rental network among the most affordable in France, Saint-Etienne is a pleasant city to live and to study in. Saint-Etienne also knows how to pamper its students, with several initiatives such as “Welcome to Saint-Etienne” or the “Saintépass”.

Saint-Etienne is also a very dynamic city economically speaking (20,000 companies, second greatest concentration of SMEs and SMIs after the Paris’ area, Cluster of excellence in Textile Design, medical and digital technologies).

• Saint-Etienne Hors Cadre: the website you must put as a favorite in your tool bar…. to know all the places to visit in Saint-Etienne and around, and the upcoming events.
• Stéphanois Hors Cadre: You want to explore the city in a unique way? You are looking for a restaurant or a café? This website will indicate all iconic places but will also suggest different tracks for site seeing. Do not miss “Le tour en ville” for a special exploration of the city.
• Loire Tourisme: touristic and unique site seeing in the Loire department.

Sainté City Crunch: A concentration of unique places to go out. In addition, every Friday, an article is published listing the best outings of the weekend. You can always contribute once you know everything about the city of 7 hills.

Along with the opera and La Comédie (national center for dramatic art), there are several other concert places and national museums presenting cultural events which you can find out about on the following websites:

• Le Petit Bulletin Saint-Etienne
• L'agenda Stéphanois

Free entrance or discounts for sports (ASSE games), cultural venues (Opera, La Comédie, Le Fil) or for transports, available here as soon as you register and valid on the dates you choose (if available when booking). L’équipe de Sainté jeunes will be present for our next “back to school” in September, to let you know more about it…

Example of a monthly budget

Total monthly expenses: around €800

Rent: €400 (approximately)

Transports: about €37 for youth pass (regular price: €40)

Food: €300

Books, photocopies...: €40

Mobile Phone: plans starting at €2 (depending on the provider)

Please note that this is an estimated budget which may differ depending on the type of housing you will find and the transport pass you will use etc.