Paris for Dreamers

by Katrina Lawrence

  Louis moved his court to Versailles in 1674, after which the Louvre fell into a state of neglect. It would have to wait for the era of the Napoléons to be brought back to life. If you turn left back at the Rotonde d’Apollon, you’ll come to the La Victoire de Samothrace (Winged Victory of Samothrace), one of the Louvre’s most legendary statues. Declared a museum in 1793, in the tumultuous years of the French Revolution (largely stocked with the artwork claimed from royal and aristocratic households, such as Mona Lisa), the Louvre started to come into its artistic own under the rule of Emperor Napoléon (it was a handy reliquary for his spoils of war). One of the spaces he commissioned is to the south of Winged Victory, the Percier & Fontaine room, named after his favourite architects, who were also a dab hand at interior decoration in what became known as Empire style. Napoléon didn’t live here, although he and his second wife, Marie Louise, married in a makeshift chapel installed in the Salon Carré, which you can find at the end of Salle Percier & Fontaine. The wedding party procession, starting out in the Tuileries Palace, had swept along the Grande Galerie. Wander along here yourself, although the space looks nothing like its former life. What a shame you can’t pop on some virtual reality goggles and see how it was when Louis XIII threw wild receptions here, 12-hour-long debauched affairs attended by thousands of guests giddy with alcohol and fatigue and fun. His rollicking father, Henri IV, would have been proud.

  It was Emperor Napoléon III who finally fulfilled Henri IV’s Grand Design — and went even further, by completing the Richelieu wing along the Rue de Rivoli. With two almost-parallel arms now reaching down from the Cour Carrée to connect to each end of the Tuileries Palace, the Louvre was once again an enclosure, albeit on a massive, sprawling scale. Napoléon III also wanted the Louvre to be reborn as a royal palace. The Tuileries in which he and his flashy wife Eugénie lived is sadly no more — it burned down during the Paris Commune of 1871. But you can well imagine their world over in the Napoléon III apartments.

  Twist and turn your way over to the Richelieu wing, where the Napoléon III rooms encapsulate the ostentation of Paris during the Second Empire. There’s enough gold to give even the Sun King a slight headache, seemingly endless swathes of ruby velvet, and chandeliers that appear to have been fashioned for giants. It’s all very much in the more-is-more, no-white-space style beloved of the Empress. In the drawing room, a divine Winterhalter portrait of Empress Eugénie looks over a scattering of conversation chairs, scarlet-and-gold creations that exemplify the period’s love of luxury and pleasure. The soirées here must have been an intoxicating blend of gossip and glitz. If only the red-brocade walls could talk!

  Despite their official name, these rooms were in actual fact home to the emperor’s Minister of State. At the time of inauguration, in 1861, Alexandre Walewski was the lucky minister. He threw a flamboyant costume ball for the occasion, just the kind of party the frivolous Second Empire loved. Walewski was very much a Second Empire kind of guy, too. He had the lineage that opened red-velvet ropes, being an illegitimate son of Napoléon I, a founding member of the exclusive Jockey Club, and a lover of the celebrated actress Rachel Félix. But really, he’d got the gig because of his wife. Madame Walewska, as mistress of the emperor, was able to whisper some sweet, suggestive words into her powerful paramour’s ear. Eugénie, apparently, wasn’t too fussed by the affair — she’d always known her husband was a serial philanderer. Napoléon III had, in fact, originally envisioned Eugénie de Montijo, the daughter of a noble Spanish family, to be merely another addition to his ever-increasing conquest count. But she held out. Legend has it that when the lusty emperor asked the way to her heart, she responded, ‘Through the chapel, sire.’ She got her man, and her tiara, but accepted that courts come with courtesans, with a certain eye-rolling humour. When one mistress turned up at a costume ball dressed as a seductive Queen of Hearts, Eugénie muttered that her ‘heart is a little low.’

  The women who have lived in the Louvre over the centuries have been witty, vivacious, glamorous and beautiful. You’ll find a homage to one of the most celebrated of them upstairs, in the French Paintings section. In one of the most photographed of all the Louvre’s paintings, two Renaissance women are taking a bath. Far from being voyeuristic, the anonymous artist has his subjects posing assuredly, gazing directly at the viewer. Not only are they totally unabashed at their state of toplessness, but they point it out: one woman is pinching the other’s nipple. Her hand is making a modern ‘okay’ gesture, although at the time it probably indicated pregnancy.

  The work is entitled Gabrielle d’Estrées et Une de Ses Soeurs (Gabrielle d’Estrées and One of Her Sisters). Gabrielle, the blonde (of said pinched nipple), was Henri IV’s great love, the only mistress he was faithful to. His marriage of two decades to Margot had been tainted by politics, mistrust and a string of affairs (on both sides), but also tinged by brighter moments of affection — although they weren’t able to conceive. Soon after becoming king, Henri initiated divorce proceedings, his heart set on marrying Gabrielle, who would soon give birth to their first child. (Margot, at least wasn’t too heartbroken; newly flush with a generous financial settlement from her ex, she threw herself into the Parisian social scene, partying with her high-cultured friends, such as poet Pierre de Ronsard, he of the French version of carpe diem: ‘Gather the roses of life today.’) By the time marriage arrangements were underway, Gabrielle was pregnant for the third time. But destiny had other ideas: Gabrielle died in childbirth, leaving Henri heartbroken, and in search of a new, fertile bride.

  Weave around to Room 801, where you’ll find the 24 canvases of the Le Cycle de Marie de Médicis (Marie de Medici Cycle). Henri’s second wife was a cousin of Catherine’s, and similarly wealthy; for Henri, in debt to her father, marrying Marie allowed him to kill the proverbial two birds. It was a match of pure, cold politics. Poor Marie had to endure living in the Louvre alongside her husband’s constant stream of mistresses — like her cousin before her. Still, she fulfilled her duties, giving birth to the future King Louis XIII, and a handy five children more, to serve various politically strategic purposes.

  The Marie de Medici Cycle is little short of riotously fabulous. It’s painted by Peter Paul Rubens, for one. It’s also so wonderfully over-the-top — mythology and allegory, nude divinities and chubby cherubs, billowing clouds and gowns — that you can’t help but fall for it. The series commemorates scenes from the queen’s life, some rather embellished. Goddesses spin the threads of the baby-to-be’s glittering destiny; angels dance at Marie’s birth; the gods Apollo, Athena and Hermes bestow wisdom on a teenage Marie while the Three Graces grant her beauty; Henri IV falls in love with her portrait while a fluttering Cupid looks on approvingly; and so on … Marie was hardly what you’d call modest. But was it any wonder she wanted to rewrite — or redraw — history a little, after a humiliatingly loveless marriage?

  In one of the series’ allegorical paintings, La Majorité de Louis XIII (Louis XIII Comes of Age), a bevy of buxom, barely dressed beauties row a golden ship, as Marie hands the rudder to her son, who’s dressed nattily in velvet, a bejewelled crown perched high on his head. He’s the second Bourbon monarch, and the first of the four Louis kings who will be France’s final pre-revolutionary rulers. You can’t help but reflect on history’s twists of fates. If Gabrielle hadn’t died — or, for that matter, if Margot had fallen pregnant in the first place — the Louis succession would not have started. And the French Revolution might not have occurred. And maybe the Louvre would still be a living, breathing, dancing palace.

  Itinerary

  • Ladurée: 75 Avenue des Champs-Élysées; 75008; 7.30-23.00 (until 24.00 on Saturday, 22.00 Sunday)

  • Givenchy: 56 Rue François 1er 75008; 10.00-19.00 (13.00-19.00 on Sunday)

  • Musée Yves Saint Laurent Paris: 5 Avenue Marceau 75008; 11.00-18.00; closed Monday, 1 January, 1 May & 25 December

  • Palais Galliera, Square du Palais Galliera 75016: see palaisgalliera.paris.fr for exhi
bition information

  • Palais de Chaillot: 1 Place du Trocadéro & du 11 Novembre 75016

  • Cité de l’Architecture et du Patrimoine: 1 Place du Trocadéro & du 11 Novembre 75016; 11.00-19.00 (until 21.00 on Thursday); closed Tuesday

  • Carette: 4 Place du Trocadéro & du 11 Novembre 75016; 7.00-23.00

  • Musée Baccarat: 11 Place des États-Unis 75116; 10.00-18.00; closed Sunday & Monday

  • Hôtel Raphaël Terrace Bar: 17 Avenue Kléber 75116; 16.00-late, May-September

  Paris promises transformation, new possibilities and fresh beginnings. The most impressive metamorphosis seen here has, of course, been the city itself, which restyled itself from one of the rankest, dirtiest, darkest capitals of Europe, into the City of Light, a shimmering mirage of limestone buildings, their sunny façades facing grand boulevards.

  Paris is a capital of beauty, and it’s also the centre of fashion, a place that knows the life-changing powers of a good dress. This is the city that gave us Cinderella, remember, whose future became a whole lot brighter after her rags were magically refashioned into a ‘cloth of gold and silver, all beset with jewels.’ But a girl doesn’t have to hope for a fairy godmother anymore — she just needs a good Parisian designer.

  Audrey Hepburn knew this long before she became the international personification of Parisian chic. In 1952, she was preparing to film her breakout 1954 hit Sabrina, which would propel her to the status of the world’s highest-paid actress. Hepburn was to embody the lead role: a chauffeur’s daughter sent to Paris for a two-year cooking course, which turns out to be the recipe for a makeover so glamorous that the eligible bachelor sons of her father’s millionaire boss melt like putty in her manicured hands. Hepburn had the celebrated Hollywood designer Edith Head at her disposal, but the actress knew that, if she was to carry off this modern-day Cinderella role believably, Paris had to sprinkle her with its fairy dust.

  You could pay homage to Audrey in Paris by recreating some of her most famous Parisian movie scenes (balloons in front of the Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel, Funny Face-style, perhaps?). Or you could start the day with a sort of Parisian Breakfast at Tiffany’s. Let’s call it … Petit Déjeuner chez Givenchy. Buy yourself a bag of croissants from Ladurée and nibble them as you walk down Rue Lincoln to Givenchy on the corner of Rue François 1er (little black dress optional). After some wistful window-gazing, head north and, at Avenue George V, turn left. Hepburn was an unknown ingénue of an actress — several years out from Tiffany’s fame — when she took herself to Paris, determined to convince Hubert de Givenchy to play fairy godfather. And so she politely yet somewhat precociously rang the bell of his atelier, now located at 3 Avenue George V.

  Legend has it that Monsieur de Givenchy, when told of an impending appointment with Miss Hepburn, was expecting the renowned Katharine to swan through the door. Instead in tripped the petite, pixie-faced Audrey, a vision of quirky cuteness from the top of her gondolier’s-hatted head to the tip of her ballet-flat shoes. She had never worn couture before, but as anyone who has watched Sabrina (and sighed over the jet-embroidered white strapless gown, or coveted the high-necked, bow-tied little black cocktail dress) knows, Hepburn was born to wear Givenchy.

  While the movie doesn’t showcase much of Paris beyond a glimpse of a snow-flurried Eiffel Tower outside the cooking-school window, the city is surely the other star of the film — which more or less serves as a two-hour advertisement for how Paris can change a girl’s life.

  Towards the end of Sabrina’s sojourn, she sits down chez elle to pen a letter to her father. The illuminated Sacré-Coeur looms outside her open windows, through which float the strains of ‘La Vie en Rose’. The lyrics are ‘the French way of saying “I’m looking at the world through rose-coloured glasses” and it says everything I feel,’ Sabrina writes. Paris has not only taught her how to swirl together a vichyssoise, but the most important set of instructions of all: ‘I have learnt how to live.’

  By this time, Hepburn had learnt how to look. So perfect was the pairing of actress and designer that Givenchy — who was also now top of his field, celebrated for his impeccably cut shapes in bold, block colours that were the very quintessence of soigné Parisian style — went on to dress Hepburn for her subsequent films. Many were set in Paris, a city that held a magnetic charm for Hepburn, who proves that you don’t need to be born in Paris, or even live there, to have the spirit of a Parisienne.

  Hepburn would often visit Givenchy at his George V studio, and in the 1960s and ’70s they’d zip around town, each in a neatly cut suit, she swinging her Louis Vuitton Speedy 25 (you can still buy the model; pop back up to the flagship store at the corner of Avenue des Champs-Élysées). In the 1980s, the duo’s pace became more leisurely, but their signature style remained sharp and well-honed. There’s a famous photograph of the two friends, walking by the Seine just around the corner from here. He’s as debonair as ever in a suit, with his hand lightly resting on the shoulder of her trench coat, which is belted up over slim black pants. The Eiffel Tower can be made out in the misty background, fittingly so, as it’s another testament to the classic appeal of simple yet quality material, impeccably tailored to create a strong silhouette.

  For an idea of what it might have been like to be a couture customer in Audrey’s time, head south and, at the end of Avenue George V, turn right into Avenue du Président Wilson, then immediately right again into Avenue Marceau. The Musée Yves Saint Laurent Paris, over on the other side of the street, is more than a gem of a museum celebrating the iconic designer’s style legacy, with a dazzling display of gowns, jewels and art; housed in Saint Laurent’s old haute couture headquarters, the museum also preserves the atmosphere of his former studio, with original notes and sketches pinned to the wall. Saint Laurent, who opened his couture house in 1961, designed some of the most fashion-defining looks over the following four decades. He could do flashy colours and exotic get-ups like nobody else, but he also excelled at that quintessential Parisian classicism that Givenchy so loved. And that Audrey adored, too; although she was sartorially loyal to Givenchy her whole life, she couldn’t help but sneak in a YSL frock from time to time.

  If you can’t ever have enough fashion, check to see if Palais Galliera, Paris’s Musée de la Mode, is open. To get there, walk back down to Avenue du Président Wilson, and take a right. If it’s Wednesday or Saturday, the popular street market will be on, and you can go gaga over the piles of peonies or rainbow of roses, also à la Funny Face. The rear entrance of the museum — now a public park — is just up on the right. A jewel-box of a building, the Palais Galliera is festooned with fabulously overscaled columns and windows, like something from a fairytale, a concentrated distillation of ebullient Beaux-Arts architectural style. If you’re in luck, you’ll chance upon one of the museum’s temporary, themed exhibitions, which are always an expertly curated collection of sartorial delights.

  This is where Givenchy and Hepburn celebrated the opening night of an exhibition marking forty years of his couture house. A recent show, Anatomy of a Collection, looked at pieces in the museum’s archives that best expressed not only the past few hundred years of fashion, but also the personalities of the wearers. One of the highlights was a Givenchy day dress of 1966 — a belted shift dolled up with puckered sleeves and two faux pochettes — which still seemed infused with the life of Hepburn, so resolute was her style and spirit, even though she had passed away in 1993. A museum might seem like an odd place in which to celebrate fashion, which is about the new and next, not the enduring and everlasting. But in Paris, the best fashion is more like art, as timeless as a museum’s classically inspired columns.

  Further along Avenue Président Wilson you’ll come to the Palais de Chaillot. Here is where you’ll get some of the most spectacular photos of the Eiffel Tower, with the geometrically tiled esplanade in the foreground. This location has been a favourite of fashion photographers for decades. Suzy Parker, the world’s first supermodel, was photographed here in
1954, in a Givenchy coat. Hepburn would soon star as a Suzy-inspired character in Funny Face, the most beloved of all her Paris movies. She plays Jo, a shy, bookish girl discovered by a fashion magazine editor who is looking for a model to give a fresh-faced feel to the latest French collections. Jo agrees to a trip to Paris as a ticket to paying homage to her philosophy icon – she eventually meets the Jean-Paul Sartre-like character while clad in the intellectual uniform of the day: beatnik-black turtleneck and slimline pants. But it’s high fashion that wins out in the end; divinely dressed once again by Givenchy, and shot against a backdrop of iconic Parisian landmarks by Fred Astaire’s Dick Avery (who is a tribute to another fashion star, Richard Avedon). It’s a movie that will have you swooning with every scene, but leave you with one unforgettably forceful message: Paris is a city that transforms a girl into a woman.