Emily in France 🇫🇷 Where's the Hygge?
I'm ready for a fireplace.
Globalization has led to a lot of places looking more and more alike. I can find the same coffee bars in London, Paris, Barcelona, New York. I can get McDonald's in any airport; English is spoken everywhere. I can get bagels in Paris, croissants in New York, and burgers pretty much anywhere. But there are a few scraps of individuality left in different cities, and as we move from summer to fall, that means looking for places to feel cozier: I'm thinking of London's pubs, America's diners, Copenhagen's coffee shops.
Paris, unfortunately, doesn't have an equivalent.
Sure, we've got cafés, but they're large and impersonal – perfect for getting lost in, for being pleasantly ignored in. Not so great when you're hoping to come in from the cold and rain and warm up. I want a fireplace, a hearth, somewhere I can sip cocoa or warm apple cider and hunker down with a good book.
Fall, for me, should be spent in an imaginary place halfway between Copenhagen, the Highlands, and New England. (I have yet to find such a place.)
But here I am, complaining about Paris. So with that in mind, here are just a few of the things I like about fall in my adoptive city.
The way the buildings cast shadows along the Haussmannien avenues in the autumn light
Hot chocolate at Angelina
The phenomenal choice of apples and fall plums (purple quetsch, green Reine-Claude, yellow mirabelle) on market stands
Apple picking in Jouy-en-Josas, just a few kilometers away (and an easy train ride from the city)
Leaves changing from green to orange to brown in the Luxembourg Gardens
New notebooks at Gibert Joseph bookshop near Saint-Michel
OK... maybe fall in Paris is not that bad.
Where I'm Eating
I'm not usually all that keen on eating Italian food outside of my mother's house, but Polpette knows what it's doing.
As always, you can find my list of my favorite Parisian restaurants here.
Where I'm Going
1. My lovely friend Sion's book launch at Paris' Red Wheelbarrow bookshop.
2. Back to Frenchie for the first time since it earned its Michelin star.
3. To see Bladerunner (the original) on the big screen at my favorite Paris cinema, the Filmothèque du Quartier Latin.
What I'm Writing
1. I visited the Korean Pop-Up co-hosted by Le Citizen Hotel and Hood this weekend – you still have a few more days to check it out before it closes for the summer!
2. Breakfast buns, beer, and more: which European country does it best? I settled the score for Far & Wide.
3. I sorted myth from fact regarding the fires still blazing in the Amazon for Organic Authority.
What I'm Reading
1. This story about a small French village fighting for its right to roosters for ConnexionFrance.
2. This story about two women who left huge multinational corporations to open a bookstore in Paris for Telerama.
3. This story in the New York Times about caring for elderly relatives.
A bientôt !
Emily in France