I Prefer Paris

Paris Window Boxes 2022-Series Three

My last two Window Boxes posts over the summer were such a big hit, I decided to run one more set.

I am thinking of offering a poster with window boxes in my Etsy Shop during holiday time later this year. Please let me know in the comments section if you think it’s a good idea and if you would like to order one.

CLICK HERE to view Paris Window Boxes 2022-Series One

CLICK HERE to view Paris Window Boxes 2022-Series Two

Come experience Eye Prefer Paris live with Eye Prefer Paris Tours, which are 3 walking tours I personally lead. Eye Prefer Paris Tours include many of the places I have written about such as small museums & galleries, restaurants, cafes, food markets, secret addresses, fashion & home boutiques, parks and gardens and much more.  In addition to my specialty Marais Tour, I also lead tours of Montmartre, St. Germain, Latin Quarter, in addition to Shopping Tours, Gay Tours, Girlfriend Tours, Food Tours, Flea Market Tours, Paris Highlights Tours, and Chocolate & Pastry tours.

https://eyepreferparistours.com/

 

 

Best of Eye Prefer Paris-Paris Rooftop Views: La Samaritaine, Hotel Le Fouquets, and Institut du Monde Arabe

I am taking a petit vacances this week like most Parisians, so enjoy Eye Prefer Paris summer reruns. 

Since you left so many positive comments and glowing reviews of my first Paris Rooftop Views blog from last month, I am bringing you a new series today. 

Today I present a potpourri. First are the views from the fabulous suites at the Hôtel Barrière Le Fouquet's Paris, just off the Champs Elysées, that I had the privilege of viewing last month on a tour of the gorgeous hotel suites. The views were from the top floors of the hotel which faced north on to the Champs Elysees and beyond and west with views of the Arc de Triomphe. I also got some cool shots from the oval windows decorating the suites. 

The second series is from the top floor of the newly reopened, La Samaritaine department store which had views of the glorious flying buttresses and architecture of the 15^th century gothic church. 

Last but not least, are the views from a more obscure place. Institut du Monde Arabe is a museum dedicated to the culture and art of the various Arab nations and is situated on the Seine River in the fifth arrondissement by the Pont de Sully. The open rooftop on the ninth floor has terrific views, facing north and west, of Notre Dame, the Seine, and the rooftops of the Ile Saint Louis. 

Two photos above-Saint Germain- l’Auexerrois

Come experience Eye Prefer Paris live with Eye Prefer Paris Tours, which are 3 walking tours I personally lead. Eye Prefer Paris Tours include many of the places I have written about such as small museums & galleries, restaurants, cafes, food markets, secret addresses, fashion & home boutiques, parks and gardens and much more.  In addition to my specialty Marais Tour, I also lead tours of Montmartre, St. Germain, Latin Quarter, in addition to Shopping Tours, Gay Tours, Girlfriend Tours, Food Tours, Flea Market Tours, Paris Highlights Tours, and Chocolate & Pastry tours.

https://eyepreferparistours.com/

Best of Eye Prefer Paris-Paris Rooftop Views: Tour Saint Jacques

I am taking a petit vacances this week like most Parisians, so enjoy Eye Prefer Paris summer reruns. 

I am christening a new photo series today, Rooftop Views. I have specifically chosen rooftop sites around Paris to take photos from. The first in the series is from Tour Saint Jacques, which is on the rue de Rivoli just by Chatelet. 

The Saint Jacques Church was built at the end of the 12^th century, funded in part by the butcher’s guild, and named Saint-Jacques de Boucherie/the church of the butchers. The old tower was replaced and rebuilt in 1522 and during the French Revolution the church was dismantled, and the stone was auctioned off. However, there was a clause in the deed of sale that the belltower couldn’t be destroyed. In 1862 the tower was declared an historical monument and in 2001, the city of Paris in partnership with the conservation of Historic Monuments undertook the restoration. It was finally completed in 2009 and reopened to the public in 2013. 

You must book tickets online and they only let about 15 people at a time because the area surrounding the top of the tower is minuscule. There was a genial guide who shared the history of the tower at the base, and he talked for about 15 minutes before the group was allowed inside the tower. There are 300 spiral steps going up and I bravely took them on last Sunday, a warm, humid day with the temperature at about 82 F. I certainly got my cardio workout that day, but it was worth it because the 360-degree, unobstructed views were spectacular, as my camera clicked away. My I-phone takes such good quality photos, that my regular camera has been collecting dust and feeling lonely. I dusted it off and attached the tele-photo lens, so I could get some sharper photos, so here are the results. 

I would love to get your feedback. More in this series coming soon. If you have any suggestions of more obscure places in Paris that have extended views of the city, please email me @ [email protected] or leave a comment. 

Here’s the link to purchase tickets. 

https://www.desmotsetdesarts.com/visites-guidees/visites-guidees-paris/visite-de-la-tour-saint-jacques

Come experience Eye Prefer Paris live with Eye Prefer Paris Tours, which are 3 walking tours I personally lead. Eye Prefer Paris Tours include many of the places I have written about such as small museums & galleries, restaurants, cafes, food markets, secret addresses, fashion & home boutiques, parks and gardens and much more.  In addition to my specialty Marais Tour, I also lead tours of Montmartre, St. Germain, Latin Quarter, in addition to Shopping Tours, Gay Tours, Girlfriend Tours, Food Tours, Flea Market Tours, Paris Highlights Tours, and Chocolate & Pastry tours.

https://eyepreferparistours.com/

New Mexico Road Trip

A little break today from Paris.

Last March after I visited friends and family in New York, Vincent and I took a three-day trip to New Mexico because Vincent needed to scout locations for his next film. Neither of us had ever been before, so it was an adventure. We landed in Albuquerque but didn’t visit the city until our last day.

We spent a great amount of driving hours on end which I am not accustomed to and another thing I am not accustomed to is driving an SUV, as I hardly ever drive to begin with, except mostly on vacation in Europe, when I generally rent a compact car. We were upgraded to a Toyota Outlander, a behemoth that was so gigantic, I had trouble climbing into it. (I swear it’s almost the size of my apartment!). I felt 10 feet high driving it and became used to it pretty quickly. Thankfully, I didn’t have to parallel park much.

We first went to Madrid, a cool biker/hippie town on the way to Santa Fe, where we only had time to spend an afternoon in, so we didn’t get to see much. However, we had the privilege of staying at the Inn & Spa at Loretto , right in the heart of the old town. We had a luxuriously appointed room, beautifully decorated with local, southwestern décor. That evening we had dinner at Luminaria, one of the best restaurants in Santa Fe, and it deserves its rating. The inventive and incredibly flavorful food was sensational. The best part was when the chef himself, Tony Smith, not only came out of the kitchen to greet us, but he brought us two special desserts, a heavenly, crème brûlée cheesecake and a divine, olive oil cake with Bordeaux cherries, candied pistachios, and white chocolate ancho Chile mousse. It turns out Tony and I had something in common, we were both New York chefs.

Vincent needed to explore two small towns, Gallup and Santa Rosa, and each was about a two-to-three-hour drive from Albuquerque, which was our base. Gallup was mostly closed because it was a Sunday, but it was cool driving on Route 66 and seeing the railroad. Today I am posting photos from Gallup and Santa Rosa, specifically the kooky and colorful signs, street art, billboards, and murals, which told me so much about the place and the local culture.

Please let me know if you would like me to post my other photos of New Mexico.

my family had this exact car, a 1968 Buick LaSabre, in fire engine red

Come experience Eye Prefer Paris live with Eye Prefer Paris Tours, which are 3 walking tours I personally lead. Eye Prefer Paris Tours include many of the places I have written about such as small museums & galleries, restaurants, cafes, food markets, secret addresses, fashion & home boutiques, parks and gardens and much more.  In addition to my specialty Marais Tour, I also lead tours of Montmartre, St. Germain, Latin Quarter, in addition to Shopping Tours, Gay Tours, Girlfriend Tours, Food Tours, Flea Market Tours, Paris Highlights Tours, and Chocolate & Pastry tours.

https://eyepreferparistours.com/

 

 

Photo Tour of Palais Royal, La Bourse, Passage Vivienne, and 75002

It’s been a long time since I’ve given a photo op tour and the other day I had a super nice family from the Westchester area of New York, a mother and father, and their children, ages 11 and 15. They were all keen on photography and had various cameras, from a heavy-duty Nikon with a super telephoto lens to an I-Phone.

It was a flawless sunny day with the crispest of blue skies. I picked them up at their hotel near the Tuileries and walked them over to the Palais Royal. In between, I took photos of the family in fun poses. After the Palais Royal, we meandered through the Galerie Vivienne, then on to rue Vivienne heading north and we photographed all around the streets near the Bourse in the second arrondissement. I was not familiar with that part of Paris, so it was a wonderful adventure for all of us, discovering new streets with marvelous architecture and cool architectural details. There was a most unusual Art Deco building with cantilevered terraces and while we were snapping photos, the gardien shared details about the building which was constructed in 1934 and was recently declared an historical landmark by the city. We ended at the Passage Panorama, another richly rewarding site for photographs.

I am posting some of my shots from the tour today, and in a few weeks, I will post the rest of the photos along with the photos the family took.

On another note, Vincent and I moved today. August 15, 2005 to Paris, and it's now been an incredible 18 years we are living here. 

Come experience Eye Prefer Paris live with Eye Prefer Paris Tours, which are 3 walking tours I personally lead. Eye Prefer Paris Tours include many of the places I have written about such as small museums & galleries, restaurants, cafes, food markets, secret addresses, fashion & home boutiques, parks and gardens and much more.  In addition to my specialty Marais Tour, I also lead tours of Montmartre, St. Germain, Latin Quarter, in addition to Shopping Tours, Gay Tours, Girlfriend Tours, Food Tours, Flea Market Tours, Paris Highlights Tours, and Chocolate & Pastry tours.

https://eyepreferparistours.com/

Jam Capsule Immersive Experience: Maria by Callas and Legacy

I received a press release a few weeks ago about a series of new immersive experiences on a 360-degree screen. I have enjoyed similar shows at Atelier des Lumieres in the past years and I thought it would be fun to check this new one out. 

Jam Capsule offers a series of video and sound experiences representing various art forms from dance to music, from painting to cinema, from ecology to architecture. For the first show there are four presentations: "Legacy, The Courage of Truth" by Yann Arthus-Bertrand, Japan, Another Look" by Pierre Goismier and GÉDÉON Programs, "Maria by Callas" by Tom Volf, and "Mystical Gardens, A Journey Through the Masterpieces of Flemish Painting to Music by Monteverdi, Mozart, Vivaldi, Verdi" by Tom Volf. Each presentation is shown on the hour, lasting approximately 50 minutes, with a ten-minute break in between, and the website lists the hourly schedule for each day.

I went on a Friday afternoon and saw the Callas and the Legacy shows back-to-back from 2pm to 4pm. Located at Porte de Versailles, a vast venue for trade shows, it's about a seven-minute walk from the metro station off line 12. Inside there was a 360-degree screen wrapped around a massive wall. 

Legacy starts off as a platform to show the wonders of the natural world with astounding aerial and most likely drone footage of mountains, seas, rivers, ice caps, deserts, canyons, and rock formations with dramatic music in the background. It slowly graduates to displaying different populations and peoples, and finally, it becomes a somewhat preachy saga, about how humans are destroying the earth with overpopulation, deforestation, pollution, plastic waste, and garbage with sobering facts and figures displayed on the floor every few minutes. Although I liked the first part of it, I thought the end part of it was a bit manipulative. 

Unlike the Atelier des Lumieres, where the images are shown on the ceiling and on the floor, the Jam Capsule experience didn’t feel as immersive, with images just shown on the walls. Also, the only place to sit for Jam Capsule was on the floor, which was very uncomfortable, plus it was difficult maneuvering around to see the different sides. 

After the Legacy presentation, I asked the staff if they could set up a chair for me so I could watch the next segment, and they were kind enough to bring a folding chair. 

"Maria by Callas" was pure joy from beginning to end. At the start there’s footage of Maria Callas, the legendary, 20^thcentury opera singer, glamorously dressed in a mink coat with a wide lapel and black hat, being mobbed by avid fans and paparazzi at the airport.  It’s followed by a series of clips from some of her most iconic opera performances from Madame Butterfly to Carmen, candid interviews, and newsreels. One clever segment was when the walls were covered with rows of images of television screens, as Callas is being interviewed by David Frost in the 1970s. "Maria by Callas" also poignantly unfolds her failed love affair with Ari Onassis, the love of her life, which led to bitter disappointment and irreparable heartache, when he left her to marry Jackie Kennedy (the details of the story have the perfect elements for an opera.) One point of fascination throughout the presentation was how impeccably dressed, coiffed and poised Callas was in every single clip, and the jaw dropping jewelry she wore. 

I will return to Jam Capsule soon to take in the other presentations.

https://jamcapsuleexperience.com/paris/en/

Come experience Eye Prefer Paris live with Eye Prefer Paris Tours, which are 3 walking tours I personally lead. Eye Prefer Paris Tours include many of the places I have written about such as small museums & galleries, restaurants, cafes, food markets, secret addresses, fashion & home boutiques, parks and gardens and much more.  In addition to my specialty Marais Tour, I also lead tours of Montmartre, St. Germain, Latin Quarter, in addition to Shopping Tours, Gay Tours, Girlfriend Tours, Food Tours, Flea Market Tours, Paris Highlights Tours, and Chocolate & Pastry tours.

https://eyepreferparistours.com/

The Common Café at Hotel Rosalie

As I mentioned on Monday in the Parc de Choisy post (CLICK HERE to read if you missed it) that I was in the 13th arrondissement to check out a new hotel and outdoor terrace last weekend. 

I was intrigued when I read about a new garden terrace, The Common, near Place d'Italie, on Vogue.fr 

 

Always looking for new things to write about here, I decided to check it out last Sunday for lunch. Place d'Italie is a busy circle/hub with many metro lines, much like Columbus Circle in NYC. Getting off the metro Vincent and I had to make our way through about 6 intersections until we arrived at a quiet, dead-end street, Avenue de la Sœur Rosalie. I was curious about the odd name, and I did some research, and found out it was named after Sister Rosalie in 1868, a selfless nun who cared for the poor.

Walking through a narrow passageway, we arrived at what looked like a handsome, new building made of stone, with some neo-classical touches and Roman-like, stone female statues on the top floor. The Common was on the lower level of the hotel and the outside garden terrace was a delight, decorated in cheerful, navy and white, wide striped couches and chairs, slatted, aluminum dining chairs, metal tabletops in leaf green, white fringed, canvas parasols, and a beautifully planted garden with ferns, flowers, ivy, and moss. We arrived at about 1pm, thinking the place would be full for Sunday lunch, but it turned out we were the only ones there. It was probably a combination of the hotel only being three months old plus it was a day short of being August, when the Parisians take their vacances.  

The appealing menu had a choice of lunch/brunch specialties leaning on the vegetarian side (the ingredients are all organic) and included a quinoa bowl, red lentil dal, and Chakchouka baguette, a baguette with red pepper cream, zucchini, eggs, melted cheddar and coriander. We ordered the Veggie Open Sandwich, and the Colorful Salad to share, and savored the calmness of the garden while we waited for our food. A few moments later the dishes arrived, prettily presented on a royal blue, oval ceramic plate, and a clear glass bowl with scalloped edges. The sandwich had a mound of arugula sprinkled on top with thin slices of red peppers, eggplant, zucchini, and feta underneath and it was so good, I could have eaten a second one. The salad was equally good with greens, radishes, sweet, cherry tomatoes, and sweet potato rounds topped with grilled goat cheese, which was such a clever idea, that I will make them as an appetizer for my next dinner party. The food was excellent and super fresh, but our only complaint was the portions were too small, and we craved more. 

After our yummy meal we were so looking forward to dessert and were disappointed that they were already out of most of the desserts on the menu. (I never understand that irritating thing at French restaurants when they tell you they are already out of things, even though we were the only people in the restaurant). By default, we chose the silky, tofu chocolate mousse, expecting some chalky, tasteless concoction but we were pleasantly surprised by the silky, smooth texture and strong chocolate taste.

 

 

 

 

 

When we finished lunch, I requested a tour of the hotel and one of the staff members kindly showed me a compact room on the top floor which extended the garden motif of the hotel with cheerful, flower-patterned wallpaper and carpeting and stunning views of the rooftops and the city. 

On the fourth floor was a delightful roof garden, only available to the guests of the hotel, similar in design to the terrace at the restaurant.

The Common also has an indoor dining room and is open Monday to Friday from 7am to 3pm, and Friday and Saturday until 10pm, for breakfast, brunch, and lunch.

8 bis Avenue de la Sœur Rosalie, 75013

https://www.hotel-rosalie.com/en/

Come experience Eye Prefer Paris live with Eye Prefer Paris Tours, which are 3 walking tours I personally lead. Eye Prefer Paris Tours include many of the places I have written about such as small museums & galleries, restaurants, cafes, food markets, secret addresses, fashion & home boutiques, parks and gardens and much more.  In addition to my specialty Marais Tour, I also lead tours of Montmartre, St. Germain, Latin Quarter, in addition to Shopping Tours, Gay Tours, Girlfriend Tours, Food Tours, Flea Market Tours, Paris Highlights Tours, and Chocolate & Pastry tours.

https://eyepreferparistours.com/

Parc de Choisy

I was in the 13^th arrondissement yesterday to check out a new hotel and outdoor restaurant terrace (more about that soon in another post) and Vincent mentioned a lovely park he discovered nearby last week.

Parc de Choisy is just off the Boulevard de Italie, close to the Tolbiac metro station on line 7. The rectangular shaped park area, measuring 10 acres, was the site of the former plant for the Ivry gas company, which was dismantled in 1935. Edward Crevel, who was the chief architect of Paris, designed the park in 1937 and he also designed the Art Deco style George Eastman Dental Institute that’s next to the park.

The garden still adheres to the formal French garden design with a perpendicular axis and a fountain down in the middle, trimmed rows of trees forming a canopy on each side, and colorful flower beds.

Also like a typical French park, there’s lots of activities including a children’s playground (I love the imaginative and playful structures in the children’s playgrounds across Paris), basketball courts, ping pong tables, an open-air theater, and even an outdoor workout facility with elliptical machine.

It was a perfect sunny summer day with temps in the low 80s, low humidity, and a cool breeze. It was nice to see Parisians taking advantage of the park by picnicking, resting on benches, working out, fiercely competing at table tennis, playing in the playgrounds, and relaxing in the cool shade underneath the trees.

128 Av. de Choisy, 75013

Come experience Eye Prefer Paris live with Eye Prefer Paris Tours, which are 3 walking tours I personally lead. Eye Prefer Paris Tours include many of the places I have written about such as small museums & galleries, restaurants, cafes, food markets, secret addresses, fashion & home boutiques, parks and gardens and much more.  In addition to my specialty Marais Tour, I also lead tours of Montmartre, St. Germain, Latin Quarter, in addition to Shopping Tours, Gay Tours, Girlfriend Tours, Food Tours, Flea Market Tours, Paris Highlights Tours, and Chocolate & Pastry tours.

https://eyepreferparistours.com/