Paris_ The Collected Traveler - Barrie Kerper [238]
• The churches. In Brittany, it’s very Catholic, as the Bretons supported the Church over the monarchy. But the churches are Gothic scare-the-hell-out-of-you churches, with pictorials explaining to illiterate people the stories of the Bible. Bretons are Gaelic and they’re very fatalistic. Stuff happens; what are you going to do about it? They’re not a depressing people despite all of this. They’re extremely curious about everything. It’s not like the States where when someone asks you how you’re doing they don’t really want to know. Bretons really want to know. They want to know about my geraniums, my car, and my wife, who is Japanese.
• The granite stone for the houses and the bridges. It’s all schist, and the colors just have a solidity to them; this is where they belong. You might think that with all this stone everything would be harsh, but it’s very soft and welcoming, and it looks really nice with my door—I painted my door a bright blue color and I love it. It’s typically Breton style and I just like looking at it. With all the stone around, everything feels like it has a solidity to it, a permanence to it, a history to it that is very, very real and tangible. Nothing about Brittany feels ephemeral—and that’s also part of what I love about it.
Photo Credit 49.3
It seemed to me that Parisians had taken care to ensure that even the smallest details of life were beautiful.
—BARBARA WILDE,
OWNER, L’ATELIER VERT
A PARIS MISCELLANY
I envision this A to Z section of my books as an informative and interesting sourcebook, one that could almost be published as a separate volume. Compiling it is both fun and overwhelming—fun because I love enthusing about these engaging subjects and overwhelming because I could have submitted hundreds more under almost every letter of the alphabet. For me, this section is a compilation of good things and favorite places—and of course a list of anyone’s Parisian favorites is almost impossible to compile because it would be too long. I am always adding things to the list each time I visit, so it keeps changing, some entries replacing others. So in the spirit of sharing and comparing, what follows are worthy entries for all sorts of sites, lodgings, shops, museums, views, words and phrases, culinary treats, souvenirs, and noteworthy bits of trivia. I’ve tried not to repeat favorites of mine featured elsewhere in the book, but forgive me if I enthuse again about a few. And, as always, please browse my blog, Thecollectedtraveler.blogspot.com, for many more recommendations and updates.
A
Accommodations
Architecture critic Paul Goldberger has written that “a good hotel is a place, a town, a city, a world unto itself, and the aura it exudes has almost nothing to do with its rooms and almost everything to do with everything else—the lobby, the bar, the restaurants, the façade, the signs, even the corridors and the elevators.” Hotels like the ones Goldberger describes exist in all price categories, and they are, to my mind, the kind of places most of us seek. Paris has an abundance of selections in all categories and in all price ranges, and if anything it will be difficult to choose from the many appealing places! In fact, for a stay of more than a few days, I recommend making reservations at more than one place. In this way visitors may experience different types of lodgings as well as neighborhoods, perhaps choosing a combination of a modest inn and one very special place for a splurge. I do not buy into the idea that accommodations are only places to sleep—where you stay can be one of the most memorable parts of your trip, and the staff at your chosen accommodation can be enormously helpful in making your trip special. Deciding where to stay should not be taken lightly and deserves your best research efforts.
It is not my intent