Since the latest Paris Fashion Week is still in our mind and as autumn is an incredible time to visit Paris, we got inspired from a number of amazing things we have lived and experienced in the city of light, and we would like to share them with you. Enjoy..!
1. TRACK DOWN A SECRET RESTAURANT
You would hope for something a little off-the-wall from the owners of Sketch. Well, Derrière is on the other side of that wall, through a maddeningly hard-to-find (how Parisian!) unmarked entrance on Rue des Gravilliers.
The entrance opens into a courtyard, and a fabulous apartment. You can eat and drink wherever you like – in the salon, the dining room, the garden, even the bedroom. The food is typically home-cooked, the menu simple and uncomplicated: homemade terrines, beef bourguignon, dark-chocolate mousse. The crowd is eclectic and bijou, unmistakably French; it’s like a scene from a moody, subtitled movie. Bottoms up! Find it: 69 rue des Gravilliers; www.derriere-resto.com
2. TAKE A DIP IN AN ART DECO LANDMARK
It should come as no surprise that swimming pools in Paris are hard to find. Either they are dark places in basements, or rooftop pools no bigger than a bath. Piscine Molitor is the exception. And what an exceptional pool it is! It was built in 1929, designed to look like an ocean liner in grand Art Deco style, by Lucien Pollet. It was where the bright young things of Hemingway’s Paris came to swim, and where the first bikini was unveiled; and in 2014 it reopened as a hotel. It was given a total overhaul and a huge colour injection, while retaining every bit of its slick Art Deco style. Sashay its 50-metre-length and imagine you’re in a Wes Anderson movie. To do that, you’ll have to book into the hotel as a guest. Find it: www.piscine-molitor.com
3. BE THRILLED BY A MODERN-DAY MOULIN ROUGE
More bottoms! Well, this is Paris. The Moulin Rouge cabaret may still exist today, but for a less touristy show, settle into a booth at Le Crazy Horse. Since curtain-up in 1951 it has been the city’s most infamous and spectacular all-female stage show. Lights! Girls! Music! And lots and lots of perfect bottoms! The show is updated every season with new numbers and choreography, sometimes with big-name collaborations from the fashion world, including Christian Louboutin. Find it: www.lecrazyhorse.com
4. RENT PARISIAN STYLE FOR THE DAY
It’s a well-known fact that Parisian women have a set of style rules that must be kept secret from the rest of the world. Well psst – there’s a place where you can borrow the style secrets, and the entire wardrobe, of one very well dressed Parisienne, Axelle Bonamy. At her rental shop Mabonneamie, near the Louvre, she has an edit of beautiful French labels – YSL, Lanvin, Balenciaga, Sonia Rykiel – from evening gowns to accessories, which you can hire for the day. Plus she’ll style you so you get the true Parisian look. Find it: www.mabonneamie.com
5. CAUSE A SCENE IN THE GARDEN
In the garden at Hotel Costes there is always – and we mean always – a scene. This decadent hotel has never suffered trend fatigue, and has been a consistent hive of activity among the music and fashion world, with everyone from Kanye West to Kate Moss coming to gossip, drink and do appropriately inappropriate things here. The garden is open all year and throughout the day – but the real time to go is after dark. Good luck securing a table. Find it: www.hotel-costes.com
6. BE BLOWN AWAY BY A NEW ARCHITECTURAL WONDER
First sight of it emerges through a thick wood on the edge of the Bois de Boulogne, followed by the sound of running water. A vast, metallic, skywards-reaching object, like something from a Space Odyssey, with water travelling towards and right through the building itself. Giant glass sails make up the exterior façade; and inside, a series of contemporary art exhibitions curated by the LVMH group. This is the Fondation Louis Vuitton, a Frank Gehry creation, completed in 2014. The only question: is it possible for any exhibition to surpass the design feat of the building itself? Find it: www.fondationlouisvuitton.com
7. INVENT YOUR OWN SCENT
Number 68 on the Champs-Elysées is the glittering, iconic home of Maison Guerlain. It is the world’s largest fragrance house, and the ultimate in Parisian beauty: four gloriously grand and glossy marble floors house the Guerlain institute and day spa, where every facial treatment is tailored to each individual client. Fragrance-junkies can follow their noses up the gilt staircase to perhaps most extraordinary of all: an entire library of scents; as well as its signature perfumes (from Shalimar to latest addition La Petite Robe Noire), they can create one all of their own. Find it: www.guerlain.com
8. MEET THE KING OF CHEESE
Alléosse is for cheese what Fortnum & Mason is for tea. Monsieur Alléosse grew up in his parent’s fromagerie, and now he has one all of his own, in the 17ème arrondissement of Paris. A faded and unassuming exterior gives way to what lies beneath: four cellars and 300m2 of ageing, handmade cheeses, aromatic and spectacular. He delivers and supplies a huge number of restaurants all over the world; and you can come here, taste, appreciate the art of cheesemaking, and buy mountains of the stuff – and to hell with your fellow passengers on the journey home. Find it: www.fromage-alleosse.com
9. GET EXPERIMENTAL ON THE DANCEFLOOR
A speakeasy vibe, brilliantly unexpected cocktails, lively DJ sets and a cool interior – the winning formula at the original Experimental Cocktail Club sparked a host of copycat bars, but this tiny place on Rue Saint-Sauveur is still packed, still hard to get into, and still one of the best. Forget your usual and trust in one of the handsome barmen to mix you up something special. Find it: www.experimentalcocktailclub.fr
10. GET LOST IN A VINTAGE WORLD
Les Puces de Saint-Ouen looks more like a shantytown than an antiques market – a vast, sprawling, world of wonder out on the far north edge of the city at Porte de Clignancourt. Labyrinthine rows of ramshackle shops are packed with surprises, strangeness and charm. Got a space in your life that can be perfectly filled by a glass lamp in the shape of a cubist head? Vintage screen prints of avante garde theatre productions, or a spool of gold thread from the 1970s, or a set of Art Nouveau buttons or a pair of ceramic cockatoos? Root, rummage, and prepare to be delighted.
From Paris,
by Georgia Papadon & team
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