Week 7: Canal Saint-Martin

In terms of locations, the Canal Saint-Martin may be a funny one to have chosen for a shoot. I mean, it’s iconic and reasonably picturesque, but there’s not an awful lot to say about the canal itself. Let’s see... it’s 4.5 km long, some of that is underground, and it connects the Canal de L’Ourcq to the Seine - but you could find all of that out on Wikipedia...like I did!

Dress - H+M

Cardigan - Charity Shop

From a more interesting point of view one could look at it as one of the early steps towards creating the Paris we know today. In 1802 Napoleon ordered it be built to provide for the rapidly-growing population, to bring in fresh water to prevent disease, and to transport goods. Up until this point Paris would have barely resembled the city we see today – it would still have been a largely medieval set-up with small dark streets unsuited to trade and too many people living in cramped, dirty housing. The canal would have been an important part of modernising the city. Speaking of modernisation – the Canal Saint-Martin must be the first body of water I've come across which has its own blog.

But, I have to be honest, the main reason I wanted to do a shoot at the Canal Saint-Martin was because it features in one of my favourite films of all time: Amélie . In this gem  of a film the heroine (Amélie) goes to skim stones on the lock of the Canal Saint-Martin to relax which makes for - in my humble opinion one of the most beautiful images in modern cinema (middle picture below). 

NOT MY PHOTO
schizoid-personality.blogspot.com

Made in 2001, set in 1997 and directed by Jean-Pierre Jeunet many of whose films to share the kooky style of Amélie.  When it first came out it was a BIG HIT and, as well as being nominated for 5 Academy Awards, it won 4 Césars (French Academy Awards), 2 Baftas and the title Best Film at the European Film Awards. Anyone who has studied French within the last 10 years or so, and indeed anyone who has seen a French film made within the last decade will probably have seen Amélie BUT if you are one of the unfortunate people to have missed out  on seeing this film I’ll give you a short synopsis and a strong recommendation.

Amélie is a young waitress living in Montmartre, who spent most of her childhood playing on her own because her parents believed she had a heart defect and home-schooled her. After discovering a small tin box full of someone’s childhood treasures one night she decides she will try to find the owner and return it. If the owner responds positively, she vows to become a regular do-gooder. While improving the lives of those around her, Amélie comes across Nino – a young man who is a bit of an outsider with a penchant for collecting strange things, such as other people’s discarded photo-booth pictures- and falls in love with him. I won’t spoil the film by telling you anymore, but  the clip below ought to give you a taste.

For the outfit this week, I wanted to recreate the shot from the film with the red dress against the green canal BUT wanted a slightly more polished look (think – as roommate suggested – Glam-elie). That said, wanted to preserve some of Amélie’s child-like awkwardness so added the oversize coat and the boots. Joy of a roommate happens to look not only like a perfect 1920s woman, she is also a dead-ringer for Audrey Tautou – the fabulous actress who plays Amélie.

Boots - Jemporium Vintage

Unfortunately we couldn’t get very near to the Canal itself (and certainly not the lock she stands on in the film) obviously too many pesky tourists have had a similar idea to us in the past! Nonetheless, the idea was to capture the spirit of the film, rather than to recreate it perfectly, so we took as many photos as we could in the surrounding park area.

Coat - Charity Shop 

Afterwards we went to warm up in a suitably Amélie-esque, a photography shop in the Marché des Enfants Rouge which is about a 15 minute walk away. The shop sells second-hand photographs and you can buy old polaroids for a euro apiece, definitely worth a look if you are visiting!

See a clip from the film here.

Weekly Wardrobe 1

So, I've decided to add a new feature - you lucky people! Alongside the shoots done around the city, I am going to start doing a post a week about an outfit worn to work (dressing up...in Paris, innit?) in which I feel good, because - as far as I'm concerned - that's what clothes are for: making you feel good. Anyway, it will normally be one, but I'm going to do three this week- just to get us started! Enjoy!

Jumper - H+M,
 Skirt - Roland Mouret, bought on Ebay,
Boots - Hobbs,
Necklace - New Look

This outfit made me feel wonderfully chic and French... and one hair-bleaching away from looking like Andy Warhol!

Jacket - H+M

Shirt - New Look
Trousers - H+M

Boots - Marks and Spencers

Earrings - Turkish Shop in Edinburgh Grassmarket
Torque - Asos

                                                                       Tuesday's outfit.

Shirt - My Dad's

Rings from left to right - Present, Accessorize, Alchemia, Etsy

Pumps - New Look

Jeans - New Look

Friday at work is normally an unspoken "casual dress" day, a trend against which I bitterly fight every week, wearing a pencil skirt just to spite this - quite frankly - lazy concept! This week, however, I caved and decided that simple could also be good, and you can't really beat the jeans and white shirt combination. Also, wearing flat shoes helped my Friday-spring-in-the-step bounciness no end!


Happy Friday all! Hope you have a good one.

Week 6: Sacré-Cœur

This week we were in my favourite part of Paris – I’ll give you some clues; it’s in the 18^th arrondissement, it’s on the Right Bank of the River Seine and its name means “Mountain of the Martyr” (due to Saint Denis – former Bishop of Paris and patron Saint of France- being martyred here in 250AD) Got it yet? No? Really? Even with all those clues? Well maybe you’ll get it if I say that it became famous as an artistic district in the 19^th century with many of the best-known artists of the modern era (such as Dali, Modigliani, Picasso, Monet, van Gogh) having had studios here.  You got it! It is Montmartre!

Red Scarf - Joy of a Roommate's 

Necklace - New Look

Dress - Second-hand (donated by lovely colleague), originally from Monsoon

Towards the end of the 19^th century, Paris was very briefly ruled by the Paris Commune, a government made up of left-wing socialists and one which is often hailed as the first working-class assumption of power during the Industrial Revolution. While it makes sense that this liberal, artistic quartier would be the place where the Commune’s first insurrection took place, it is far harder to couple this view with that of Montmartre as the "mountain of the martyr". This is where this week’s shoot location comes in: the basilica of Sacré-Cœur.

Upper Arm Bracelet - Asos

Earrings - H+M

Situated at the highest point of the city, Sacré-Cœur was built, not only as a symbol of moral order, but also to act as a penance for the "crimes" of the Commune (one of which was murdering Georges Darboy, the then Archbishop of Paris). It was designed by architect Paul Abadie in 1875 – though he would be long-dead by the time of its consecration in 1919. The front of the basilica displays equestrian statues of two French saints; King Saint Louis IX and Joan of Arc, and the mosaic inside the dome "Christ in Majesty" is one of the largest in the world. As the mosaic shows, and as the name suggests, the basilica is dedicated to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, and it was this image that I decided to use for this week's outfit inspiration.

Belt - Belonged to my Ma

Yellow Scarf - Small Turkish shop in Edinburgh Grassmarket

The Sacred Heart has been one of the most common Christian images since the 17^th century and is supposed to symbolise Jesus’ love for the world. The image is a flaming heart, shining with "divine light", encircled by thorns, pierced by a lance wound and bleeding. I thought I’d leave the lance-piercing and bleeding bit out, but apart from that I decided to take these features and use each one as an individual part of the outfit. The heart can be seen in the cuff and the necklace, the thorns are represented by the spiked bracelet and ring and the studded belt, and the red and yellow scarves are to show the “divine light” or flames. Because the Sacred Heart image is often used as a tattoo, I decided to make the look a bit punky and I chose the blue dress to mirror the background colour of the mosaic.

Cuff - Claire's Accessories (no judging), Ring - H+M 

Another exciting development was that this week’s photo-shoot took place at night. Delightful boyfriend and I headed over to Montmartre in the afternoon only to realise that clement weather brings tourists out in full force and – let’s be honest – what nicer place is there to spend a sunny winter afternoon than Montmartre?  Take my story as a cautionary tale folks and if you are going to visit Sacré-Cœur (which you absolutely should) try to head there in the morning. Anyway, my photographer of the week and I decided to do what all professionals do and decided the situation was a sign from the universe that we should spend the next couple of hours eating nice food and waiting for the tourists to clear off. Doing the shoot at night made the experience far more pleasant and the basilica looks wonderfully dramatic but the picture quality seems to have suffered a tad. Still – a useful lesson to have learnt, and I hope you all enjoy the shoot anyhow.

Week 5: Musée Rodin

Between 1727 and 1732, in Paris’s 7th arrondissement, a beautiful big house was built for a wigmaker who happened to be more or less the only person to emerge  from the Law crisis (one of the worst times in history for France’s economy) with any money. Unfortunately for him the mansion – called the Hotel Biron - was only completed a year before his death, after which it was sold on and on, from person to person until 1820, when somebody had the sensible idea to place it in the capable hands of the nuns of Sacré-Cœur who turned it into a school for girls.

The school was closed in 1905 (when the French government legally separated the Church from the State) and the building split up into lodgings. The nuns’ loss became the house’s gain when the sculptor Rodin rented out some of the rooms and turned the hotel into his studio. Towards the end of his life he donated all of his sculpture to the State of France under the condition that it would turn the hotel into a museum dedicated to his work. This it did and now the hotel is one of the two sites which make up the Musée Rodin and this is where we did this week’s shoot.

Born in 1840, Auguste Rodin is widely recognised as the father  of modern sculpture. As is the fate of many great artists, fame and acclaim took their time to reach him and, although he dearly wanted academic recognition, he was never accepted into Paris’ foremost art school. Many of his most interesting works were criticised during his lifetime because they didn’t follow the generally-accepted sculptural rules; they weren’t mythological  or allegorical and lots of them didn’t even have subjects. Rodin was more interested in individual character and physicality  and he would often get his models to walk around his studio (stark-naked) rather than pose, so he could get a better idea of how they moved.

This sculpture - "The Age of Bronze" - was Rodin's first full-scale piece.
It is so realistically-proportioned that Rodin was accused of cheating
 by taking a cast of a real human body.

To pay homage to Rodin’s love of physicality, I wanted the look this week to be structured and simple, and to allow for as much freedom of movement as is possible in a floor-length ball dress... As well as its practical cut, I chose this dress because it is the perfect colour to mimic  the aged, weathered bronze out of which so many of the sculptures around the Musée and gardens are made.

The Thinker

I decided to carry on this theme with various pieces of bronze or copper jewellery which led to another home-made fashion project. When compiling the outfit, I realised I didn’t own the bronze/copper necklace which was really needed to complete it, but that I did own enough Kirby grips to make a scale model of the Eiffel Tower. SO, the necklace you can see in this shoot is a golden bird necklace from Accessorize, worn back to front with a fan shape at the front made of Kirby grips... Easy peasy!

Dress- second-hand, originally from Ghost

Earrings - Turkish shop in Edinburgh Grassmarket

As for the shoot itself, I am beginning to notice that it gets a little less scary, and a little less nerve-wracking every week. As soon as the coat was off this time, I just decided to enjoy making the bizarre shapes Josie directed me into. I think the tourists enjoyed it too, they certainly took an awful lot of photos... What’s more, we got our first sunshine in weeks, which is just as well since nothing less could have done justice to the beauty of the garden and surroundings.

This is probably Rodin's most famous statue, The Kiss.
 I hope you're all appreciating the picture, I got told off about 30 seconds after taking
this because I hadn't noticed the "No Photos" sign...