It’s all opulence and grandeur at this hôtel particulier on Boulevard Haussmann. The Musée Jacquemart-André is a private art collection with everything that you might expect. Rich, deep red velvet walls; fine Italian Renaissance and Byzantine art; a Fragonard (currently, unfortunately, on loan to an exhibition); an unexpected, but very delightful, run in with Élisabeth […]

We took an “early” (8h20) train for a day trip to Rouen, France because I’ve had the desire to see the cathedral, which starred in Monet’s series of paintings on a study of light. To think we stood in the same square as a genius! I can only hope that the photos Cecil and I […]

There’s a delightful surprise in the Latin Quarter, something wildly unexpected and out of the blue — or, rather, the appropriate expression is “out of the Haussmann architecture.” It’s la Grande Mosquée de Paris. There is a small admission fee, but if you love architecture, this is such a treat. It was built between 1922 and […]

When I was in university, I was obliged to read Chateaubriand. While it would be very nice to wax about all the lovely things I learned and how marvellous he is, the truth is that I remember very little. Even that is a generous statement. I remember nothing. My level of French at the time […]

Humid sunshine and ominous clouds greeted us as we tumbled off the train in front of the minuscule train station. We had arrived in Auvers-sur-Oise, a small village where the public transport comes only once an hour. We were already slightly sticky, and the sun high in the sky, as we followed the only road, […]