About this blog

Visitors to Paris expect graceful architecture, impressive monuments, beautiful parks and gardens, enticing cafés and restaurants, and lots of shopping. And Paris does not disappoint. Paris also offers mysteries large and small. What is that odd-looking building? What do those signs mean? What are those people doing? What’s behind this wall? Where do I find this? How do I do that? Why can’t I go in there?

I cannot get enough of Paris: its people, its buildings, its boulevards, its customs, its organization, and its less-well-known corners. Alone and with others, I have walked its streets for hours, taking pictures, asking questions, venturing into courtyards, translating unfamiliar words, peering around corners, and sometimes just standing and staring. What I can’t figure out on these walks, I delegate to the research department (me, at home, in the evenings, with my collection of Paris books and maps).

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After a few posts, I decided to merge this effort with the blog Parisian Fields, which I write with my husband. Maybe one day I will pick up the threads of what was intended to be a guide to Paris’s history, form, and development for city lovers (including my fellow urban planners), but for the time being, I will focus on that blog.

Philippa