To work, or not to work (on Sunday)!

Yesterday, a very controversial law was discussed at the Assemblée Nationale (the French Parliament) presented today to the Conseil des ministres (the government). Why? Because it would allow certain stores to open on Sundays and late at night. This would be limited to touristy areas, but for France it's a serious breach in the "rest on Sunday" habit - even though already 30% of the people work on Sundays (hospitals, firemen, gas/petrol stations...). To illustrate this big debate, I found a photo that I took in La boutique de l'Assemblée Nationale (where the law is going to be discussed in January), a store where you can find many many blue/white/red objects! 

Philately

I love this little store around my corner... It was opened in 1899, by Theodore Champion, who was one the first to believe that trading used - and unused - stamps was a real job and that you could make money with it! Theodore passed away in 1954, but his store is still active, it now belongs to the Nordfrim A/S group, a large stamp dealer in Northern Europe.

Time to change... time

Here we go again... like every year Europe (except Iceland) switched to Day Light Savings time (heure d'hiver). Which means we're going to sleep an extra hour! And like every year, the whole thing is very controversial: 54% of the French are against it, according to a recent poll. I'm not one of them, I like it (but more in summer of course...). Anyway, here is a photo I took especially for the occasion at La Pendulerie, a store specializing in antique clocks. They are all amazing.

Turning old into new...

You might find it hard to believe, but this building, up until 2002 was... a factory called L'atelier des cendres - the ashes workshop - (you can still see the name above the door). This company used to recycle the "ashes" of jewelers as a way to collect what was left of gold and silver. It was totally renovated in 2013 by Uniqlo, the Japanese clothes manufacturer who kept most of the old features (including the stunning chimney and the beautiful staircase). It's definitely worth a visit if you happen to be in Le Marais.

Holy cow!

In one of the most beautiful covered passages of Paris, the Galerie Vivienne (not to mention the one where I live of course, the Passage Verdeau, which to me is the most beautiful one LOL!), I found the store of Emilio Robba, a florist that specializes in "permanent botanicals and landscaping environments.". You may dislike the idea of "fake flowers and plants", but not after you've seen the ones of Emilio's! He even uses them to make beautiful scupltures, like this one of a cow that I could not hep but take a photo of. A must visit place, for sure.

Cool store

Here is a cool store front that I found at 52 rue des Trois frères in the 18th arrondissement. I was lucky enough that there weren't any cars parked in front of it for it's a pretty narrow street full of cars. Fyi it was painted by Raphe and Caligr, two street artists that apparently are well known. Now what does this store sell? I have not idea... I'm not even sure it's still a store to be honest..

And my favorite florist in Paris is...

...Hervé Chatelain, a very talented artist that I always admire the work of, when I pass by his shop at 140 rue Montmartre, in the 2nd arrondissement. I did today and took this photo in his shop window, I'm sure you'll agree with me.

Hold up at Colette's

I only posted once about colette (not the writer!), but the "concept store" located in the very chic rue du Faubourg Saint Honoré that was created in March 1997 by Colette Rousseaux. It's a place to visit, just for fun, even if you're not the kind that is after the latest trends in the world! The reason why I took this photo (which has a lot of reflexion, I know, but is still kinda cool!) is that on March 22 colette was robbed! They stole about 600 000 euros worth of jewelry! I'm sure colette will get over it...

Happy Thanksgiving!

According to my stats, about 50% (48 more accurately!) of the people who visit PDP on a regular basis are American... That is why I generally allow myself to wish them a happy Thanksgiving, even though we have no such celebration here! We do have a store called Thanksgiving though and it's known for selling Thanksgiving food or course, but also all kinds of typical American food, like blue cheese dressing, NY bagels and Velveeta cheese ;-) I personally never get tired of reading the famous Merci Donnant column by Art Buchwald  that used to be posted in the International Herald Tribune (an English language paper published in Paris) every last Thursday of November. 

Down to the last "detail"

October 1st, the theme day is back again ;-) Today's theme is "Details", which I thought was cool. Until I had to take a photo for it... What detail(s) was I going to take for this theme? Fortunately I passed by a Repetto store today - a French manufacturer who makes garments and accessories for dancers. They had this dress on display, with a nice detail: dragées. So here you go! Have a look at other details around the world...

No vacation for bread!

Congés annuels means "Annual leave" in French and as you can guess I took this photo in front of a store - a boulangerie, more precisely. Nothing extraordinary as most shopkeepers close in August except that this one mentions the Paris Prefecture de Police (Paris Police Department), which is quite unusual. I investigated... and found out that in Paris, boulangers (bakers) cannot choose freely when and how long they can close! Why? For a historical reason... Before, bread used to be the main type of food that people could afford. On October 21, 1789, a Paris quarter became short of bread and the only open baker did not have enough bread to feed everyone. He ended up... hanged but the angry - and hungry! - Parisians. Since then the organisation of bread supply (including annual leaves) is ruled by the Paris police department.   

Buy French!

You know how I like to support young entrepreneurs! Well I found two of them on my street yesterday... They opened a brand new shoe store (Thomaas & Nicolaas) where they sell French manufactured (or at least designed) shoes (which is really not common these days...). But the real plus of this store is that you will find there models that you won't see anywhere in the world like in chain stores! Besides, let me remind you that on this very same street, you can also visit another extraordinary shoe store that I've already featured on PDP. I wish them a lot of success!

Who "stole" Le Printemps?!

Here is a view of one of the buildings of Le Printemps, one of the major department stores that we have in Paris. Printemps means spring in French and from what I understand weather-wise it's not exactly spring in Paris at the moment (but it will improve for the picnic which is this Sunday at one o'clock, bla bla ;-)). Hence my title... But that's not all Le Printemps is also in the middle of a controversy here because it's currently being bought by Qatari investors and some people think that Qatar is buying a little too many things these days (including the very famous Paris soccer team...).  

The end of Virgin...

Like in many countries in the world the traditional record and book stores suffer from the competition of the web (even the word "record" sounds outdated now!). No wonders then that Virgin Megastores, one of the main books and music chain stores in France has filed for bankruptcy today. It includes the huge Champs Elysées store where I took this photograph earlier last month (they obviously had a batman special that day!). Sad for the 1,000 people who are going to be made redundant, but not very surprising. Who is going to replace Virgin on the Champs Elysées? Nobody knows, but most likely Apple, Uniqlo or Forever 21...

Sales time...

I must not stay up too late tonight for tomorrow is the first day of Les soldes (the sales) and stores will open earlier than usual! The sales are highly government regulated in France and they can only take place during certain periods (Winter, Summer and 2 other floating periods). It is compulsory to clear off what in the store (it is prohibited to  replenish your inventory less than 30 days before the start of the sales) and the old and new prices must be clearly displayed on each tag. It's also the only periods where selling at a loss is allowed.

Monkey chocolate business

Art can find its way everywhere, can't it? Like in chocolate for example... Hence the stunning sculptures that Patrick Roger, one of the finest chocolatiers (chocolate maker) in Paris can do. One of his stores is located at Place de la Madeleine, and that is where I took this photo. This chimp is entirely made of chocolate as you can imagine, and he was not the only one in the store. Huge success! Now I need to taste what I bought there!

Living in a fantasy...

I knew it, this whole end of the world thing was just a tale... To celebrate, here is precisely something that comes straight away from a fairy tale: Cinderella's horse carriage! Don't look for the horses though, they did not have enough room... "They" are the Galeries Lafayette people, where there have this on display right at the entrance! Huge success.  Are you all set with your Christmas shopping BTW? Cause I'm not! 

Top hat!

I took this photo at rue des Rosiers, which the heart of the Jewish part of Le Marais (a must visit place if you like falafels and bagels!). I fell in love with this coat the minute I saw it, even though it's not exactly everyday wear! Besides since obviously the place (it's called Yoahm, after the name of the owner of this store) was closed, I don't know how much it costs. But i'll go back and ask! 

The new Printemps

For once we had a little bit of blue sky today in Paris and I did not resist catching it on "film"! I was at Le Printemps area (one of the main Paris department stores) when I took it and as you can see there is scaffolding everywhere. Why? Well because the new owners (the Rinascente group and the Deutsche Bank) who bought it in 2006  have decided to turn the place into a high-end store and  to do so has decided to give it a little face lift - for a slight investment of 30 million Euros (of which 7 only for the scaffolding)! Let's hope it'll be worth it... No matter what, the facade of the building, which is protected, will still remain the same of course, which is good news...

Champagne for everyone!

From time to time, I've decided to give you shopping tips (and still focus on the photo of course, for those of you who are not interested in shopping or don't plan to come to Paris LOL!). The first one of this series is La Boîte à bulle, a new store you can find at 67 rue de Levis (a street known for it's market) in the 17 th and in Levallois (in the close suburbs of Paris). They sell 3 kinds of - very good - Champagne (brut, rosé and blanc de blanc) that they source from the Champagne region (of course), in the East of France. The store looks really great and Matthieu Lécussan (in the photo), the young entrepreneur who started this business recently, can tell you absolutely everything about Champagne!