Paris Day Eight – Shops

I think we’ll never leave the apartment early; I think the cool weather doesn’t encourage us either.
—
In the morning we ate some almond pastry tart (galette des Rois) that were being sold everywhere for the religious celebration of Epiphany while watching TV.

On the news it showed the UK is under siege of snow and it seemed like schools and transit was at a stand-still over there. Paris under a blanket of snow seems romantic but I understand the city doesn’t have any snowplows so having only a few fat flakes falling today is fine by us.

We left in the afternoon with plans of going to E. Dehillerin the famous cookware store. We left the apartment, crossed through a passageway via Institut de France, crossed over Pont des Arts and we were now on the right-bank of Paris.

Locks on the bridge are placed there by lovers to show that their love is locked in.

It didn’t take us long to find E. Dehillerin and I found myself again in this intimidating and also welcoming store. Mike eyed the copper pots with envy and I eyed anything with an E. Dehillerin stamp on it. When we were here in 2008 I had bought a cake pan

Lily with her pan from E. Dehillerin

and it was interesting to see that I couldn’t find it again or any fancy-top cake pan. High turn over of limited supplies or low on inventory? At the end of our visit I got a plastic bowl scraper and Mike sweetly asked for (me) a silicone pastry mat, each marked with the store’s name.

Lily with her new E. Dehillerin purchases and a water carafe from Lafayettes Maison.

Around the area are at least a couple more cookware shops that we perused, La Bovida and Mora.

Nearby I took pictures of more moldy cheese and got a look at whole truffles – I’ve never seen them before!

Truffles

Moldy Cheese

We walked by La Samaritaine, a large department store that hasn’t been open since 2005 – it makes me think of stores Mike and I see in Toronto that close for “renovation” and then never open back up. Supposedly though there are still plans for La Samaritaine to re-open in the future.

We next headed to the two big department stores of Galleries LaFayette and Printemps. Today is the first day of the Winter Sales in France and the streets and stores in the area were understandably busy.

France regulates when sales go on and all stores will have the opportunity to clear their inventory for the next five weeks until 9th of February. Sale discounts are deep! Of course the keen shoppers that we are, all the items we bought today were not on sale! My carafe item is bulky and maybe I could’ve gotten it back home but now it’s with us forever, with me imagining how many sweater layers I’ll have to wear for it to fit in the luggage. Mike got a new fancy wallet at Printemps – Happy Birthday Mike!

Our new water carafe up-close

We headed home going through the Louvre square and I took a bunch of night time shots of the pyramids. It was coldest then and I actually broke out my gloves.

Paris has some of the best lit buildings that show off its depth and architecture and even when cold air is whipping around and you’ve taken pictures of the same building during the day it’s definitely not the same at night.

Oh today was a good day especially when at the end of a day I get two pillows and toasty blankets (away from Mike)! I also finished another book!

~ Lily

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