Art center on the Seine: the exhibition boat
Since June 2019, a floating exhibition center including a street art bookshop and a rooftop café on a barge has been located directly below the Pont des Invalides. It was designed by the architect Gérard Ronzatti, who also realized the floating Hotel OFF Paris Seine on the Quai d’Austerlitz in 2016. Street art expert Nicolas Laugero Lasserre has equipped a total of 1,000 square meters with his own collection, and there are also temporary exhibitions with guest curators. Currently and until the end of February 2023, works and documentation by the Parisian Julien Malland can be seen on the exhibition boat, which is accessible free of charge. Under the stage name Seth, the childlike protagonists of his facades as so-called Passe Muraille have the childlike protagonists of his facades step through walls worldwide, just as if they were looking directly into the apartments behind.
More than 20 years ago, Nicolas Laugero Lasserre started collecting street art: “People called it vandalism, but I think these artists kept a critical eye on current events.” His privately run arts center ended up on the water through a joint project by the city of Paris and the Haropa port association called Réinventer la Seine, i.e. reinventing the Seine. It thus joins the city’s effort to make the Seine friendlier: the banks have been cleaned up and lined with cafes, street food carts and fitness trails. So there is now less graffiti under the Seine bridges. But a museum for street art on the river.
fluctuart.frPont des Invalides – 2, port du Gros Caillou, 75007 Paris
Street food and award-winning cuisine: À table!
You won’t find award-winning cuisine as cheaply in Paris as you can at the Food Society: the 3,500 square meter food court with 15 stalls from well-known Parisian (street food) restaurants opened last autumn just a few steps from Montparnasse train station. Also on board is a team of young star chef Mory Sacko, who in his “Street Rôtisserie” varies specialties all about poultry: grilled duck hearts in teriyaki sauce (10.50 euros) or chicken leg served in a creamy mafé peanut sauce (10, 50 Euros). Opposite, another protagonist of the TV cooking show Top Chef is cooking up, Adrien Cachot presents Basque tapas in his Mono Bar, such as pork ears à la plancha (8 euros).
From 12:00 p.m. to 11:00 p.m. in the hall’s graffiti-heavy industrial design interior, there are so many flavors of food that every hunger should be satisfied. Also the one at the Blend stand after a juicy burger, quickly dipped in hot beef jus before eating, with potato brioche dough buns from Meilleur Ouvrier de France baker Frédéric Lalos and patties from Yves-Marie Le Bourdonnec, which otherwise has 3 stars -Cooks count among his customers. But there is also Moroccan couscous at Yemma, oysters, ceviche and fish & chips at Presqu’île or empanadas from the Andean cuisine at Tambo. Bon Appetit!
foodsociety.fr, 68 Av. du Maine, 75014 Paris
In the Musée des Arts Forrains you can see old fairground rides like this carousel.
(Photo: Pavilions de Bercy)
A rush from the Belle Époque: fair like in the old days
Even 125 years after its construction, the bicycle carousel in the Musée des Arts Forrains, the museum of fairground art, is fully functional – much to the delight of visitors. They pedal off on the velocipedes to get the two-and-a-half-ton truck moving: the ride can reach speeds of up to 60 kilometers per hour – a speed frenzy from the Belle Époque that still has an effect today. But there are also enough carousels for visitors who are less afraid of heights: with wooden gondolas and rearing horses, to the creaky, lively music of perforated organs.
In 1996, antiques dealer Jean Paul Favand opened his magically staged art exhibition in the former Bercy wine depot. The Hippo Palace has also been part of the collection since 2020. This itinerant fairground palace from 1900 is considered a national treasure. Individual parts of it have already been integrated into the exhibition, but it will probably still be a while before the entire carousel, with a diameter of 16 metres, has been completely restored and has found its place. So back to the velocipedes, after all they always work, come what may! The museum guide jokes that this fun at the fair, driven by muscle power, is surprisingly up-to-date, particularly in the course of recently ordered energy-saving measures.
arts-forains.com, 53 Av. des Terroirs de France, 75012 Paris, tickets for 18 euros.
Home Office: Victor Hugo worked and lived here with his family from 1832 onwards.
(Photo: Bjanka Kadic/Imago Images)
At the poet’s: the Maison Victor Hugo
In 1832, the Hugo family of six moved into one of the loveliest squares in Paris, the Place des Vosges in the Marais. For 16 years, the main writer of French Romanticism lived here with his family behind Renaissance brick walls. Since 1903 there has been a museum in the rooms rented at that time. After two years of restoration, it was reopened in 2021 with a number of new features, such as digital recordings from Hugo’s exile town house in Guernsey and a hidden café complete with courtyard seating and a patisserie. The guide calls the museum tour “Évocatif” because the evocative juxtaposition of the original furniture and everyday objects allows you to immerse yourself in the author’s world, but due to the lack of photographs no one knows what the rooms actually looked like back then.
The Chinese salon that Victor Hugo designed for his lover Juliette Drouet in Guernsey was also set up here. The poet’s muse not only organized the flight of the entire Hugo family to the British Channel Island after Hugo had been involved in a revolt against Napoléon III, but also moved there himself, to the house opposite. This is where the chinoiserie-studded salon, in which Hugo demonstrated his talents as an interior decorator, came from, since he designed the decor, wall panels and furniture himself. Just amour, even if – oh, là, là! – extramarital.
maisonsvictorhugo.paris.fr6 Pl. des Vosges, 75004 Paris, entry to the permanent collection is free
Dancing and drinking tango: the Hôtel Rochechouart
Even the Art Deco facade speaks of casual grandeur. And the Hôtel Rochechouart, which reopened in 2020 after thorough renovation, keeps its promise: in the 4-star hotel in the middle of Pigalle there is a chic, old-Parisian brasserie in the Rez-de-Chaussée and an incredibly charming terrace on the roof small bar and view of Sacré-Coeur and tout Paris. The recently re-established Club Mikado Dancing has been added to the hotel basement. Léo Ferré conjured up its magic in the late 1950s in his song “Le Temps du Tango” – the time of tango. In a light-colored suit and white shirt, according to the chansonnier, he spent nice Sundays in the Mikado.
You can’t do that anymore, as the club is currently only open on Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays, but even then music (by DJs or jazz combos) plays in the oxblood-red interior. If you don’t want to dance at all, just sit on one of the velvet sofas and drink the tango cocktail: with rum, Campari, pineapple sage and green lemon. Very refreshing. A few tangoes later, it’s already past midnight. And so it’s going to be something with the beautiful Sunday (morning).
hotelrochechouart.com/mikadodancing, 55 Blvd Marguerite de Rochechouart, 75009 Paris
Express massage at Galeries Lafayette
The entire basement of the Magasin Coupole of the Galeries Lafayette, the headquarters of the traditional department store opened in 1912 on the Boulevard Haussmann, has been dedicated to beauty, fitness and relaxation since last summer: the 3000 square meter “Wellness Gallery” has the tubes and pots of 200 cosmetic brands united, in addition to scented candles, electrical devices against wrinkles or copper tongue scrapers (which are said to help improve breath, among other things). In this world of powder tones, eyelashes are lengthened, faces are cleaned, piercings are pierced, deep inhalations are taken with oxygen therapies or sweating in the hammam.
A physiotherapeutic cabinet offers, among other things, yoga, when the weather is nice, right next to the steel frame of the Art Nouveau glass dome on the roof of the Grand Magasin – with a view of the Eiffel Tower, unless of course you’re practicing downward dog. And in the treatment cabins of the Maison Chill, the express massage easily fits into the lunch break of stressed Parisians. The latter is also good for tourists, especially if they have walked for a long time because public transport is on strike again.
wellness.galerieslafayette.combasement of the Magasin Coupole of the Galeries Lafayette, 40 Boulevard Haussmann, 75009 Paris
Notice
The research trip for this article was partly supported by tour operators, hotels, airlines and/or tourism agencies.