All the best fairy princess things

For our Paris by Site class we studied the rise of the department stores one week. For class we met no other than in the department stores themselves. The passages couverts which specialized in specialty stores who only would sell for product per store morphed into the department stores: magic buildings which sold golds of all kinds. Everything under one roof. On a side note it is funny to realize that recently things have come full circle with stores like Galleries Lafayette now having speciality sections which only sell longchamp or burberry. To a similar degree, exoticism was on display when those first magazins turned up and I could not help things that what goes around comes around came into play every time I walked into Galleries Lafayette due to the fact this year their advertising scheme was based on Morocco and they actually had Middle Eastern men dressed in Moroccan garb serving mint tea to parched customers. Well in any case, my class began our tour in le bon marche which has the art of selling down to a tea. From chandeliers made of whisks in the home department to only the most avant garde furniture like a chair made of shelves which housed numerous books ( I mean how perfect would it be to sit in your favorite chair and reach onto the arm rest to find your favorite book at your fingertips) to a lighting fixture that resembled a cloud. As we mounted teh escalators I pictured all the aldies from bygone days bustling through the stores an image newly imprinted in my mind from an article we had read exactly about the culture of the department store "The Ladie's Paradise" by Zola-it is interesting to think that things we do everyday like shop or enter an establishment of any sort have a culture about them. There is an art to even the most mudnane of things. I thought of my mother as I strolled through the merchandise how many hours we have spent together sifting through clothes and accessories perfecting the art of fashion discovery and money saving. From there we headed over to Galleries Lafayette and climbed to the roof to see a view of Paris from uphigh. A breath of fresh air although when you see it you realize that all buildings in paris and relatively low sanctioned to be built only to a certain level which to me keeps the charm and ambience. Afterwards we stepped over to the opera Garnier designed by a certain Napoleon III. I have never seen any interior as exhuberant as this, much more decadent than even Versailles. The sweeping staircases were where they actually filmed the movie Marie Antoinette as of late. The hall sparkled with chandeliers and glimmered with ornate ceiling design. Not one inch of the room was left untouched it was rococo on drugs. In one area above an elegant red circular couch was a ceilings painted with bats. There was also the beautiuflly pianted Chagall ceiling in the actual theater being admired by a few Israelis. Then I stopped in with my friends to the Repetto store by Cafe De La Paix, one of the most posh cafes in Paris. It is a well known dance gear brand, repetto, and the store was akin to a candylan for dancers. They have even begun making shoes which come in all colors and every style of ballet flat available. There bags have angelina ballerina on them its like they took a page out of my thoughts.... Then we decided to have a bite at the most delicious restaurant there is le pain quotidien which specializes in praline cream which is better than nutella. And their bread well...their bread comes piping hot in the freshest baguette. It was there that marina and I once attempted to create a power point for our project and I g-chatted with my father on their patio. It was amazing that through google earth he had pinpointed my exact location. But that was another day, on this day Marina Kayleigh and I decided to walk kayleigh home since we were absolutely high out of our minds on noisette I mean they literally give you an entire jar to enjoy with your bread. We quite enjoyed our meal with much laughter and story telling surrounded by Nutcracker music of all things and Satie. We walked Kayleigh back to her place where we usually would have metroed it out. The thought on my mind was so this is what taking the metro on the outside feels like. You really do miss things when you are underground who would have thought? We sang our song from the film Coco Avant Chanel ay coco o coco and I completely wrapped my hair with my scarf into a gigantic bun spiral of sorts. It was rainy out and we made a bubble of laughter and friendship to protect us. We were really getting into exotic areas a merging of cultures I even saw a Palm tree so we knew we were in the south of pparis.