C’est quoi?
Just what is it that makes Paris so “je ne sais quoi”?!?!?
Photo Credits: The Blog
What can I say. Paris disarms me. I am unfailingly infatuated with the untellable pleasures of its fashion, its art, its food, its architecture, its night scenes. I’ve been countless times, and each time I go it feels like a whiff of fairy dust springing out from the generally insipid mundanity of my everyday life. And each time I leave, I always wonder the same thing: how have I managed to live and how will I ever go on living without all of it?!?
No matter how many times I go, Paris is wondrous, grand, and charmingly chi-chi. There is a bid to spontaneity in Paris. That is, I am to tacitly understand that the city’s endless charm can and will change my direction or plan at any given moment. The city has a distinctly seductive (a tantalizing noir) allure that beckons and entices me to play along to its own rules and rhythm and style.
How does Paris do this? Just what is it that makes Paris so “je ne sais quoi”? Well I’ve unlocked the secret. There’s no question about it. Paris is…🤫 … is… Female. Oui, c’est ça. Paris è toute Femme.
Yes, that’s right. Paris is innately and gushingly sophisticated and graceful and mystical and seductive like any given female.
Travel anywhere in Europe always nurtures my obsession with food and my interest in everything aesthetic, but Paris commands of me more. She commands a sense of romantic nostalgia and slowness and an elegantly flirtatious mentality known only to la genre féminin. When I’m in Paris, I exist as if in a painting or a conversation from the golden age. I riff off of Her the way a dancer and a musician riff off of one another. I surrender to Her siren’s allure, and She reciprocates, mainlining my veins with a pulsating energy for joie de vivre.
Elle è toute femme. She is All Woman. And paramount in all that is Woman. Watch as Her sophistication and precision will tempt your feminine senses… with la mode, ses parfumeries, and La Seine romantique… with Her elegance, exuberance, and deviance… les swanky brasseries, the Crazy Horse, La Tour Eiffel… and ohhh Her steamy buttery flaky delicate croissants, puffy macarons, plush camembert, silken fondant du chocolat, and lusciously spreadable and salty pâte by the hot knife-fuls. C’est tout la crème de la crème de la vie en rose!
Par-ee, oh how you seduce my eager eyes, my yearning nostrils, my surrendered palate and perked up ears…. You’re the reason my senses erupt into lustrous pearls of iridescent rapture. Who cares if your language is pretentious. How could it not be, with your Chambertins and Romanee-Contis, your haute couture, Châteaux Relais, and Musée D’Orsay?
When I first tried these juicy, vibrantly green and garlicky frog-legs, my first thought was “Where in Heaven’s name have you been all my life!?!? Evidently, they’d been right there all along, at Le Petit Lutetia. And although I couldn’t answer my next question (why haven’t you reached mainstream global cuisine, like hamburgers or pizza?), the one thing I knew for sure is that they’d secured their place in my heart as an ultimate (and sadly unattainable) palate crush.
I have much too much to say about Paris and much too little of your time and this space. So….
Paris, and dear reader, I bid you farewell… and à tout de suite, my sweet!
Must stays:
- 1 Place Vendome
- Relais Christine
- Le Cinq
Must dining:
- La Perouse
- Café des Ministères
- Lucas Carton Le Table
- Restaurant Brigitte
- Le Petit Lutetia
- La Tour D’argent
- Lafayette’s Paris (8 rue d’Anjou)
- Le Chateaubriand
- Pottoka
- Aux Crus de Bourgogne
- Le Voltaire
- Les 110 Taillevent
Must coffee:
- Coutume (A++, incredible coffee)
Must bars:
- Hemingway Bar
- Ritz Bar
- Maxim’s
- Les Très Particuliers
- Hotel Costes
- Maison Revka
- Madame Rêve
Must patisserie/ chocolaterie/ supermarche:
- Alain Ducasse Chocolaterie
- La Pâtisserie du Meurice par Cédric Grolet
- La Grande Epicerie, Le Bon Marchés
- La Pistacherie
- Yann Couvreur
Must clothing boutiques:
- L’Eclaireur (all locations special women’s upscale boutique)
- Charvet (men’s everything)
- Le Bon Marchés (upscale department store)
- Crimson (socks)
- Didiet Ludot (vintage)
- Le Village
- Hermes
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