🇫🇷 💌 The Paris Love Letter #155

THIS WEEK IN PARIS
Public Displays of Art
(And A Very Zen Four-Year-Old)

One of our favorite ways to explore the city is by bike, and this week's ride took us straight through Place de la Concorde. The square was hosting an open-air photography exhibit, which is exactly the kind of thing I love about Paris. I've started calling it PDA, Public Displays of Art. Museums are great, but there's something special about art that spills out into the streets for everyone to enjoy.

Towering over it all is the Luxor Obelisk, a 3,300-year-old gift from Egypt to France. Its twin still stands at the entrance to the Luxor Temple, where this one once stood. Wild to think about while scooters buzz past.

The best part of the afternoon, hands down, was our son. He parked himself in front of the Fontaine des Mers (he’s circled in red above) and wouldn't budge for twenty minutes. When we asked why, he said, "I feel connected to it. When I watch the fountain, I can see forever." We backed off to let him have his moment with the fountain.

From there, we crossed to the Left Bank and made our way into the Latin Quarter, stopping for crêpes on Rue Mouffetard (bottom left), one of the city's oldest market streets and still one of its liveliest.

Earlier in the week, a walk around Buttes-Chaumont led us to Sunny (top right), a Franco-Californian restaurant on the edge of the park. Go for the Eggs Benedict!

Just for fun, here’s a photo of a dog we saw riding on a scooter. 👇

Linking You to Paris

➡️ What to do this weekend in Paris: Sortir à Paris rounds up the weekend's best: Paris's first-ever nighttime Vélib' race, a free plant festival in Versailles, and the Counterfeit Museum open for a rare free Sunday.

➡️ 8 French Sandwiches You'd Find at Parisian Bistros and Can Make at Home: Food & Wine takes you on a tour of French sandwich classics, from the croque monsieur to the jambon-beurre to the sun-drenched pan bagnat.

➡️ 7 Iconic Works From Alexander Calder’s Major Paris Retrospective: Artsy gives an inside look at the Fondation Louis Vuitton's blockbuster Calder show, running through August 16.

➡️ 11 Paris Hotels Within Walking Distance of the Eiffel Tower: Condé Nast Traveler shares its picks for stylish stays near the Iron Lady, from palace icons to quiet design-forward finds.

VISITING PARIS
The Institut du Monde Arabe

If you've never been, put the Institut du Monde Arabe on your list. It sits on the edge of the Seine in the 5th, just across from the Île Saint-Louis, and it's one of the most quietly stunning buildings in the city.

Opened in 1987, the IMA was built as a cultural bridge between France and the Arab world, a place to explore Arab civilization, art, and ideas through a Western lens while staying rooted in Arab tradition.

The building itself is the draw. The south-facing façade looks like an intricate screen of Arabic geometric patterns, almost like traditional mashrabiya wood lattice. Look closer, and you'll see it's actually made of 240 mechanical apertures, each one filled with tiny metal irises designed to open and close automatically with the sun, like a camera aperture. When it's bright, they close. When it softens, they open. Inside, the light filters through in constantly shifting patterns.

The catch? Many of the motors have broken down over the years. A restoration helped, but plenty are still frozen in place. Honestly, I kind of love that. A building that was supposed to breathe with the sun, now holding its breath.

Now for the real reason you go: the rooftop. Take the elevator to the 9th floor, and you'll find Dar Mima, a beautiful Moroccan restaurant opened as a tribute by French-Moroccan comedian and actor Jamel Debbouze in honor of his mother. The view is, no exaggeration, one of the best in Paris. Notre-Dame, the Seine, the rooftops of Île Saint-Louis, all laid out in front of you.

We stopped in for a mint tea in the afternoon. Pricey for a drink, but you're really paying for the view, and on that front, it delivers.

FRENCH PHRASE OF THE WEEK
"Avoir le coup de foudre"

The Phrase: "Avoir le coup de foudre"

Phonetic: [ah-vwar luh koo duh foodr]

Literally: "To have the strike of lightning." To fall in love at first sight. Suddenly, totally, with no warning.

The Context: The French are romantics, but they're also precise about it. Le coup de foudre isn't a slow build. It's not a crush. It's the lightning bolt, the moment something hits you so hard you know your life just shifted. The phrase is most often used for people, but the French use it generously. You can have a coup de foudre for a city, a café, a song, an apartment, a painting. It's one of those phrases that feels a little dramatic in English and completely normal in French, which tells you something about both languages.

How to use it:

• The Person: You meet someone at a dinner in the 11th, and halfway through the second glass of wine, you realize you're in trouble. Coup de foudre.

• The City: You come to Paris for a long weekend, step out of a taxi near the Seine at dusk, and something cracks open in you. You'll be back. That's a coup de foudre for a place.

• The Apartment: You walk into a beautiful fifth-floor apartment with crooked floors and a view of the city from a Haussmann balcony, and you know before the agent finishes talking. Done.

How I Found This Phrase: I had my own coup de foudre years ago, in Thailand of all places, with a Parisian woman who would eventually become my wife. The city came with her, part of the package, and turned out to be its own slow-burning love story. But the first hit, the lightning, was her. The French had a phrase for it before I even knew I needed one.

FRENCH SONG OF THE WEEK
Christophe Maé - Les bougies

Christophe Maé isn't a household name in the US, but in France, he's been making some of the most soulful pop-folk music of the last twenty years. He's got a raspy voice, a harmonica usually within reach, and a gift for writing songs that feel lived rather than produced.

"Les Bougies" is a perfect entry point. There's a classic bluesy feel to it, nothing fancy, just a solid groove, a voice, and a good melody. The simplicity is the whole point. It’s a well-built song that leaves room for the feeling.

Put it on in the kitchen on a Sunday morning. You'll get it.