shopping in paris

shopping in paris

• 8 Aug 2011

As you know, I love to shoot shops but when I travel I'm more of a window shopper than an actual purchaser. I travel with a backpack on wheels so that restricts what I can buy. Here is what caught my eye.



When I was in London, I paid a visit to Petersham Nurseries where I found this display of Astier de Villatte ceramics. Astier de Villatte was on my list of shops to visit in Paris but it took me 2 attempts before I found the store. Memo to self - take address with you when trying to locate a shop in a foreign land.



The shop is located in a ramshackle old building oozing with character. I hope they don't ever decide to renovate the store as it's just perfect the way it is.



Their ceramics are gorgeous but expensive and there was no way anything purchased would survive the journey home.



Have you ever been completely intimidated by the staff in a shop? Well the staff in the flagship Bonpoint store had me quaking in my boots. Considering it's a children's clothes shop, they were terrifyingly severe in their demeanour. It's a gorgeous shop filled with beautiful children's clothes shoes and toys with amazing displays. 



As I stayed in the 10th arrondissement again, I made another visit to La Galerie Vegetale (now sadly closed). This time I was without my french speaking travel buddy so I was a bit hamstrung by my lack of French. The shop is as lovely as ever - part florist shop/part art gallery.



Of course I had to revisit le petit atelier de paris, one of my favourite shops (now sadly closed). It has very limited opening hours so unless I raced from the train the day of my arrival it wouldn't be open again during my stay in Paris. So that's what I did and I managed to restrain myself and not buy out the shop. Le petit atelier de paris now has an online shop but unfortunately the shipping costs to Australia are prohibitive. 2014 - unfortunately le petit atelier de paris appears to have closed it's doors but it still has it's online store.



Two of the parcels contain gifts for friends and the larger parcel contains bowls that no doubt will appear on my blog sometime in the future. For now, they're still safely wrapped up in their brown paper packaging tied up with string.



Of course no trip to Paris is complete without a visit to Merci. I did a shopshoot there, so there are more images to share with you later in the week.

So until then,

Jillian