Coup de Foudre

July 6, 2012

Making Polaroids in Paris

Chris and I are bad tourists. We aren’t huge on sight-seeing and are especially uninterested in spending part of our vacation standing in a long line to see something we once read somewhere that might be important for some reason.

On this particular trip, we knew we’d be seeing a lot of the Paris essentials while shooting Amanda and Chase’s elopement, so we were even less prone to seek out anything more specific than a cafe here, or a park there. Mostly we just like to wander. Pick a street or metro line and see what’s on the other end — that’s our style. For the record, Bois de Boulogne is an awesome place to go if you wanna get lost in a quiet, serene, crowd-free forest with the occasional prostitute standing on the side of the road.

We didn’t do anything terribly exciting on our own accord, neither of us speak a lick of French and I personally think the Eiffel Tower is kind of ugly. We walked a lot, took baths to soothe our aching feet, and had mostly boring meals because we were shocked by how expensive everything is. Though I don’t know that I’d ever use the word “boring” when talking about jambon de Vendée, which I snarfed at every opportunity.

Even still, I managed to fall completely head over heels in love with Paris, and dream of a life where I can make annual visits to La Ville-Lumière.

Polaroid Spectra Film - Impossible Project PZ 600 Silver Shade - Menilmontant, Paris, France

Polaroid Spectra Film - Menilmontant, Paris, France

Polaroid Spectra Film - Sacré-Cœur Basilica - Paris, France

Polaroid Spectra Film - French Cat

Polaroid Spectra Film - Hotel De La Bretonnerie - Paris, France

Polaroid Spectra Film - Video Game Mosaic - Paris, France

Polaroid Spectra Film - Water Fountain in Paris, France

Polaroid Spectra Film - Bois de Boulogne - Paris, France

Polaroid Spectra Film - Dinner at Le Cafe Parisien - Paris, France

Polaroid Spectra Film - Dessert at  Le Cafe Parisien - Paris, France

1. The view from our Air BnB apartment: Church of Notre-Dame-de-la-Croix in Menilmontant.
2. Chris at the bottom of our apartment’s staircase.
3. Sacré-Cœur Basilica — We didn’t go inside.
4. One of Philippe’s cats, Jimmy. =^..^=
5. The view from our room at Hotel de la Bretonnerie.
6. Mario Mosaic, by Invader, which we saw loads of!
7. Just a random, epic water fountain. No big D.
8. Upper lake at Bois de Boulogne, where we collected rocks and pine cones for souvenirs.
9. Our last meal in Paris, and the best one we had all week! Dinner with Philippe at Le Cafe Parisien. That’s Chris chugging some wine in the far left. I had duck for the first time. It ruled.
10. Dessert with Philippe. Chris had crème brûlée for the first time. It also ruled.

SHARE THIS STORY
COMMENTS

[…] mostly shot Polaroids of our adventures in Paris so I could reserve my energy for our romp through Versailles with Amanda and Chase, but Chris and I […]

What camera did you use? I’ve been looking for a camera that takes photos like this for a while… :-( but no luck hahah but lovely photos anyhow!

Thanks, Basil. These photos were taken with a Polaroid Spectra.

hope to be going there in october. this makes me really excited :)

Sigh… makes me miss Paris!

Paris is one of my favourite cities. There are places that you go that you feel that you don’t have to go back to, but Paris never gets boring.

I ADORE this post. A different view of Paris — love it. PS: I’m the same way when traveling; I just love to wander around too and get lost.

Also, I love how you mixed fonts in the post. If I knew how to do that… (well, then I’d do it often.)

Thanks, Jacqueline! Isn’t getting lost in a foreign city the ultimate best? To me, there’s no better way to make your vacation YOUR VACATION, if you know what I mean!

As for the fonts, aren’t they fun? It’s simply a bit of Google Web Font trickery! As long as you know how to edit your blog’s stylesheet (CSS) and header, it’s pretty self-explanatory: https://www.google.com/webfonts And, FWIW, the two fonts I have on the site right now are Oswald, and Cedarville Cursive. Have fun!

It’s always amazing to look at the world through your eyes, Kim! Your clever eye finds details and angles that I love.

The first image makes me think about a wonderful book of Atget’s parisien shoots.

You’re my kind of traveler! I hate sight-seeing. I usually walk around and find interesting things that way (and avoid tour groups full of middle aged people with bad style, no manners and a deeply ingrained belief that seeing all of Europe in 5 days will make them cultured and give them an edge in social situations back home).

It seems like you did Paris right. Thank you on behalf of my people.

ADD A COMMENT