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Category Archives: Paris streets
The writing on the wall
I once bought a book called How to Read Paris, which was really just a book about the city’s architecture. If I were to write a book with that title, I would talk about the words on the city’s walls. … Continue reading
Posted in Paris streets
Tagged Association Valentin Haüy, Confucius, Eileen Gray, ghost signs, graffiti, nuit debout, Philippe Starck, street signs
4 Comments
Finding Café Momus
A few weeks ago, we received the following comment from Martin Nelson in England on our blog about Rooftops: I am a singer, and lived briefly during 1982 in the Palais Royal district, Rue Molière… I had an old 1950 guide … Continue reading
Posted in Paris history, Paris hotels, Paris streets
Tagged A.H. Brodrick, Alfred Delvau, Annuaire-Almanach du commerce, Café l’Auxerrois, Café Momus, Charles Marville, Henri Lévis, Henry Murger, Journal des Débats, La Bohème, La Samaritaine, La Vie de Bohème, Le Relais du Louvre, Rue des Prêtres St Germain l’Auxerrois, The Bohemians of the Latin Quarter, Thomas Boys
22 Comments
Twenty questions
A happy Saint-Sylvestre to you all! A few of you may wonder what that means, but in France, New Year’s Eve is often called by the name of the saint whose day falls on December 31. That fact got us … Continue reading
Posted in Paris churches, Paris history, Paris popular culture, Paris postcards, Paris streets
Tagged Arc de Triomphe, Arc du Triomphe du Carrousel, avenue Foch, Café Varenne, C’était un rendez-vous, Centre Pompidou, chasse-roue, Chevaux de Marly, Claude Chappe, Claude Lelouch, Deyrolle, Dufayel, fiacre, La Samaritaine, Le Grand Mogol, Marie Antoinette, Marie Curie, Mel Bonis, metonymy, Notre Dame du Travail, Oscar Wilde, Place Beauvau, Point du Jour, Porte St-Denis, Porte St-Martin, Quai d’Orsay, Rose Bertin, rue de Varenne, rue Xaintrailles, rue Xavier-Privas, Saint-Sylvestre, Sophie Berthelot, St-Fiacre
14 Comments
Rooftops
One of our favourite TV programs, Dix Pour Cent/Call My Agent,* opens with the following image, taken either from the roof of the Louvre or from a drone. It is never on screen for more than a few seconds, and … Continue reading
Posted in Paris architecture, Paris history, Paris hospitals, Paris shops, Paris streets
Tagged Alexis-Hubert Jaillot, Call My Agent, Couvent des Feuillants, Dix Pour Cent, DTACC, Grands Magasins du Louvre, Hall des Tapis, Le Bon Coin, Maje, Matthaüs Merian, Oratoire du Louvre, Renaissance Paris République, rue de Marengo, rue de Rivoli, rue St-Honoré, Val de Grace
42 Comments
Empty streets
Birdsong. That’s what I hear these days when I wake up. Not the sounds of neighbours going to work or getting the kids ready for school. But the sound of robins and sparrows and starlings. I hope our friends in … Continue reading
Early one morning
We do not, as a rule, take early-morning walks in Paris. If we do not have a morning appointment, we tend to dawdle over breakfast, reading and chatting and enjoying the view from the windows. Quick showers are not an … Continue reading
Posted in Paris gardens, Paris history, Paris hospitals, Paris parks, Paris quartiers, Paris streets
Tagged aqueduc Medicis, Centre Hospitalier Sainte-Anne, Charles-Auguste Questel, empêche-pipi, Georges-Eugène Haussmann, Hôpital Rochefoucauld, Lycée Notre Dame de France, Maison Santé des Soeurs Augustines, Monastère de la Visitation, Plancher de Jeannot
9 Comments
Stepping back into the river
Hello again. Rebonjour. Our sabbatical from blogging lasted a year. We are uncertain about how and how often we will continue, but we did want to say hello to our readers (if you are still there) and post an update. … Continue reading
Posted in History of the blind, Paris civic functions, Paris streets, Paris travel
Tagged bus routes, Fondation Custodia, gilets jaunes, May Day, RATP
18 Comments
A question of time
What do you remember most vividly about your first visit to Paris? For me, more than 20 years ago, it was the astounding range of merchandise in shops and galleries, the parks, and the cleanliness of the city. For a … Continue reading
Posted in Paris civic functions, Paris history, Paris hotels, Paris streets
Tagged Carl Albert Mayrhofer, Charles-Augustin Meurice, Compagnie Générale des Horloges Pneumatiques, Ernest Resch, Flood of 1910, Hotel Meurice, Jules Albert Berly, Paris Flood 1910, pneumatic clocks, rue Ste-Anne, Scientific American, Victor Popp
13 Comments
Nostalgic images of a vanishing city
Photographs of Paris in the snow were big news earlier this month. We are Canadians. As Gilles Vigneault sang of this country, “Mon pays ce n’est pas un pays, c’est l’hiver” (My country is not a country, it is winter). … Continue reading
Posted in Paris art, Paris nostalgia, Paris popular culture, Paris streets
Tagged commissionnaire, Curiosités de Paris, Edmond Morin, Franco-Prussian War, Grand Café d’Harcourt, Henri Boutet, Le Monde illustré, Neuvaine de Saint-Etienne-du-Mont, Neuvaine de Sainte Geneviève, omnibus, Serge Férat
12 Comments
A city street, a lamppost
It was the photograph that caught my eye from a high shelf in a bookshop. A street with a lamppost and the corner of a building; two men walking in opposite directions. It was only later that I registered the … Continue reading
Posted in Paris books, Paris civic functions, Paris postcards, Paris streets
Tagged du Gaz et de l’Eclairage, Dufayel, Frédérique Bousquel, Jacques Lusseyran, Jo Baker, Joseph Epstein, Journées du Patrimoine, Marcel Epstein, Mémoire de l’Electricité, Mémoire des rues, MEGE, Ronald C. Rosbottom, rue de Clignancourt, rue Ramey, Second World War
21 Comments
Parisian Fields 