24 hours in Paris
Expect the City of Light to evoke sense of wonder
This summer, my wife and I had a 24-hour layover in Paris. We did this on purpose. As a travel writer, I travel to once-in-a-lifetime places such as Antarctica, Svalbard and Kabul, and to iconic ones such as Paris as often as I can. I never tire of coming here because of its infinite ability to recharge our sense of wonder, appetite and taste for life.
This time I wanted to see if we could pack five enticing new places to go and things to do into a single day and night. Here’s how the City of Light came through for us.
Shop at Galeries Lafayette. It isn’t just a big department store on Boulevard Haussmann. It’s a 10-storey art nouveau palace of consumer chic that offers a free fashion show every Friday. Bien sur, there’s every high-end brand you can imagine, but also Big Fernand burgers at their separate store, Lafayette Homme, and even an in-store gallery with rotating shows of the latest in French design and fashion. galeriedesgaleries.com
Hôtel du Cadran. This three-star hotel is a short walk to both the Eiffel Tower and Les Invalides. Even better, it’s 100 metres from “The Best Street Market in Paris,” the cobblestoned Rue Cler. Its patisseries and boulangeries, cheese shops, fish stores, delis, chocolate shops and cafes look like a movie set, until you walk out of them groaning with for- bidden treats. cadranhotel.com
The Centre Pompidou. It began as an urban renewal project for the then dowdy Le Marais/Les Halles area of Paris. Its design and sheer scale shocked traditional Paris when it opened in 1977. But it quickly became one of the world’s most popular cultural venues and one of the most visited monuments in France. What is it, really? Think of the Centre Pompidou as the busiest public library, museum of contemporary art, lecture and event space you’ll ever see. centrepompidou.fr/en
Fondation Louis Vuitton. Imagine that a private foundation builds the hottest new contemporary art museum in the world. Toronto-born architect Frank Gehry was brought in to build it plunk in the middle of the Bois du Boulogne. Opened in 2014, the result is a museum as daring and important as the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao. In fact, the outside and rooftop gardens are so magical that you could forget there’s stunning modern art inside. Have lunch as we did at the museum restaurant. It’s named Frank, as the restaurant in the Art Gallery of Ontario is — also designed by the same Frank fellow. fondationlouisvuitton.fr/en
Dinner at Derrière. Hidden in a courtyard off a tiny street in the Marais is a restaurant perfectly attuned to young, hip Parisians. Derrière is almost an afterthought, because it’s surrounded by four bars that each draw their own crowd. The food is better than what you’d get at a sidewalk cafe. But it’s the peoplewatching that makes dinner there so memorable. I mean, do all gorgeous young couples use their iPhones to flirt across their table for two? derriere-resto.com Bob Ramsay is a Toronto writer, communications consultant and founder of RamsayTalks.