If this is Thursday it must be postcards, 621

 

 

 

 

 

Interior, Sainte-Chapelle, Paris, France

 

This beautiful color postcard showing the interior of Saint-Chapelle in Paris is from Collectionnez les Cartes Postales, Editions Chantal, of Paris, France.  The card is identified as a Mexichrome product.  Mexicrome specializes in French souvenir cards

 

When Bob and I were in Paris in 2018 we visited Saint Chapelle.  The long wait to get in was well rewarded by the stunning interior beauty.  Visitors are not allowed to use flash camera settings inside the church and the photos we took that day appear quite dark but could be lighted up using Photoshop, see examples of a similar view below.  Also, it was crowded inside and difficult to get photos without people. 

 

 

 

Before adjusting the light

 

 

 

After adjusting the light

 

Saint-Chapelle or Holy Chapel was constructed sometime around 1238 and consecrated in 1248.  Commissioned by King Louis IX of France, it is considered among the highest achievements of the Rayonnant period of Gothic architecture.  The king had the chapel built to house his collection of Passion relics including a piece of the crown of thorns.  The crown of thorns was once in the gold box on top of the arch with angles holding a replica of the crown just beneath it.

 

 

 

The crown on thorns was originally housed in the gold box above the arch

 

 These angels holding a crown of thorns were below the box

 

The crown of thorns was later moved to Notre Dame where it survived the 2019 fire.  Sainte-Chapelle is now a museum under the French Centre of National Monuments.  

 

 

 

This statue of King Louis IX is featured in the lower chapel

 

The lower level, where the postcard picture was taken, is beautiful but the upstairs chapel with its tall stained-glass windows is breath-taking and awe inspiring.  Here are both the exterior view of Sainte-Chapelle and an interior view of part of the upper chapel. 

 

 Exterior of Sante-Chapelle

 

 

Interior of upper chapel showing the spectacular stained-glass windows

 

 

For additional information, see:

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sainte-Chapelle

 

 

If this is Thursday it must be postcards, 128

 Two postcard views (above and below) of booksellers on the wharf near Notre Dame Cathedral, Paris, France ca 1918/1920

We often think that a photographer gets his or her perfect picture with one shot but what is more likely is that numerous photos of the same scene are taken before that perfect image is caught.  These two postcards by the French photographer Pierre Yves Petit, better known as Yvon, are just part of an unknown number of shots taken probably over a period of several days.  Robert Stevens includes both the top version and another slightly different version in his book Yvon’s Paris, published by W.W. Norton, 2010.  The top view is the most famous of the two shown here.  I had not seen the bottom version before finding this postcard that was included in with a group of others by Yvon.  It is slightly different--fewer people, the bookseller engaged in conversation with another man, less fog, not as many paintings, the paintings leaning against the stall are uncovered--than either of the others.

The scene was photographed just shortly after the end of World War I and shows the vendor stalls near Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris.  Yvon preferred to take pictures in the early morning or evening when the shadows and fog made the images more interesting to him and allowed him to produce some very ethereal looking pictures. The old man did not want to sit in the cold and have his photo taken but it is said that Yvon paid him 5 francs to do so.  It was not said how many days or attempts it may have taken to get the most famous image or if Yvon had to pay the man each day he took pictures of him.  To me, one of the beauties of both pictures is that they do not look posed but instead look like candid photos or glimpses of everyday life. 

Labeled as booksellers on the wharf it looks like this man is mostly selling paintings.  Today there are still vendors along this area and many of them do sell used books, postcards, paintings, and other used items.  These are the same type of stalls or lock boxes that appeared on the postcard of Montpellier L’Esplanade shared in an earlier postcard Thursday.  Most of the items would be locked up in the box overnight and the box opened the next morning when the seller arrived and set up his shop.  He would then bring new items or the more valuable items with him to add to the collection of wares for sale.

Both cards are unused and have almost identical information printed on the reverse.  The top card is numbered 1. H. 538 “PARIS … En Flanant  Les bouquinistes du quai de la Tournelle.”  The second card bears the same title but has the number 1. B 538.  Both have divided backs for the address and message and Yvon’s own company in Paris published them.  The bottom card has a decorative rippled edge while the top has a plain border and straight cut edge. 

The photo above was taken in 2012 and shows the wharf near where the postcard pictures were taken.  Unfortunately, I did not get any photos of the stalls or vendors though I walked past them several times and even looked at the things they were selling.   Although it cannot be seen in this picture, Notre Dame Cathedral is located just in back of the cherry trees at the left side of the photo.  The tour boat filled with people is heading toward the bridge that is covered with padlocks, sometimes called the “lock bridge.”

For more examples of Yvon’s photographs see the book Yvon’s Paris by Robert Stevens mentioned above. 

If this is Thursday it must be postcards, 88

 Sacré Cœur, Paris, France

This unused Yvon postcard shows the basilica of Sacré Cœur in Paris, France.   As the picture beneath it from last year shows we approached it through the streets of Montmartre, came up from the side and did not climb all these stairs, only some of them.  Just the bell tower and part of one dome are visible at the top of the photo but it does show how steep the hillside is.  There is also a funicular rail line that climbs straight up the hill for those who do not wish to use all the steps or go up the steep hillside. 

The title on the reverse of the card is "Le Sacré Cœur de Montmartre et l'escalier monumental"  [the Sacred Heart of Montmartre and the grand staircase].  The card is numbered I.B. 553 and the publisher is identified as "Editions d'Art "YVON" 15, Rue Martel, Paris Fabrication française."  The postcard is one in the Paris -- En Flanant series. 

Posted earlier was a city panorama that included Sacré Cœur from a distance; however, this Yvon photo is so stunning it is getting a postcard Thursday of its very own.  The basilica is located on the highest point in the city and was designed by Paul Abadie.  Construction began in 1875 and was finished in 1914.   The official dedication occurred following the end of World War I in 1919.  The stone is travertine and exudes calcite which keeps the exterior white even with today’s pollution and the stresses of the weather.  Cameras are not allowed inside. 

Here are two links for more information including a short video presentation:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YLs5OIKeO-c
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sacr%C3%A9-C%C5%93ur,_Paris

If this is Thursday it must be postcards, 42

Pont Nuef – Panorama of Paris from the Louvre, ca early 1900s

Pont Nuef or New Bridge was the first stone bridge to be built that did not have houses on it.  Although we cannot see all of them on this card the bridge has twelve arches.  It spans 912 ft (275 m) and connects the Ile de la Cité with both banks of the Seine River.  Construction of the bridge began in 1578 but it was not completed and open for traffic until 1607.  The Notre Dame cathedral towers can be seen in the central background.

[For more information:  Eyewitness travel, p. 86]

 

The Seine River looking toward the “Lock Bridge,” 2012

The Seine River flows around two islands, Ile de la Cité and Ile St-Louis and is connected to the mainland by several small bridges and the larger Pont Neuf.  This view is from one of the smaller bridges by Notre Dame looking toward the bridge that contains all the padlocks (see previous post about the “Lock Bridge,” Paris).
 

Panorama of Montmartre, ca 1915

This second card shows the church of Sacré-Coeur and the bell tower at the top of the hill in the Montmartre district of Paris.  Two Catholic businessmen, Alexandre Legentil and Hubert Robault de Fleury, made a vow at the beginning of the Franco-Prussian war in 1870 to build this church to the Sacred Heart of Christ should France be spared the impending Prussian invasion.  Construction of the church was begun in 1875, completed by 1914, and dedicated following World War I in 1919.  Legentil’s heart is in a stone urn in the basilica’s crypt. 

The bell tower at the right contains one of the heaviest bells in the world weighing 18.5 tons.  The clapper weighs 1,900 lbs or almost one ton.  The tower was completed in 1895 and stands 252 feet (83 meters) high.  It might be an optical illusion because the bell tower looks a little taller on the card but the Eyewitness travel guidebook states that the ovoid dome of the church is the second highest point in Paris.  

[For more information:  Eyewitness Travel, pp 226-227]

Paris -- picture gallery

 

Arc de Triomphe

We crammed so many things into our brief stay in Paris that it was hard to choose the pictures for this last post of Paris before moving on to Provence and the Riviera. 

We did go up to the top of the Arc de Triomphe and look out at the city at dusk and saw the Eiffel Tower as it was lit up for the night.  Our tour guide, Angelique, said the view from there was as good as from the Eiffel Tower and had the advantage of being able to see the tower.  It was a good choice.
 

In front of Notre Dame with Mrs. Gimlet, Thing One, and yours truly

 

One of our group leaders decided we needed to have our picture taken so he kindly took this shot.  Note—Thing One will not smile until his braces come off.

Shakespeare and Company bookstore 

This bookstore has a cameo appearance in the movie Midnight in Paris.  It is crammed floor to ceiling with used books and was very crowded with people when we visited.
 

There are so many little crowded streets like this lined with shops and places to pick up a pastry or two.  We found a cute little café around the corner where we could eat wonderful food and watch the people walking by.  

Or this street as we climbed Montmartre up to Sacré-Coeur passing the house of Toulouse-Lautrec in pink on the left side of the street.  
 

Mrs. Gimlet and The Lacemaker

 

There are only two Vermeer paintings at the Louvre, this very small one titled “The Lacemaker” (1669/70) and one other “The Astronomer” (1668).  Vermeer didn’t paint many pictures but the ones he did were scenes of Dutch middle class everyday life, interesting, and lovely.  Since Mrs. Gimlet makes Hardanger lace we especially wanted to see this painting.  As we were admiring it a young woman came rushing into the room asking frantically where the Vermeer paintings were because she wanted to see “The Girl with the Pearl Earring.”  We had to tell her that it wasn’t in the Louvre.  She was very sad.

Venus de Milo

 

This man wasn’t the only man to take pictures of the backside of Venus.  She does look lovely from both sides but I found it a little amusing—if you follow the camera angle. 

The Louvre is huge and it is easy to quickly get overwhelmed with the size and sheer number of things there.  We had selected just a handful of items we really wanted to see and knew it would be impossible to see everything in the limited time available.  If I ever have the opportunity to go back I would take a couple of days at least and stick to one area instead of spending so much time running around trying to find particular items.  There are a lot of stairs too and while the teenagers and Mrs. Gimlet did fine with them I needed to rest every now and then. 

Mona Lisa
[photo courtesy of the Gimlets]

 

The Mona Lisa is relatively small and very much in need of cleaning.  It looks dull in comparison to some of the other paintings.  The crowds around her were dense and it was hard to get close enough to get a good look. 

 

Looking up through the glass pyramid at the Louvre
[photo courtesy of the Gimlets]

The day of the Paris marathon and President Sarkozy’s speech to a crowd of about 100,000 people we left the city and went to Versailles.  I had mixed feelings about Versailles.  It is very beautiful but all the gold leaf and ornamentation was a little too much for me.

For some years the entrance gates were not gilded but because Versailles is such a popular tourist attraction the French government has in recent years been restoring the gates and the buildings to their original splendor.  It takes many layers of gold leaf to cover the gates and the rooflines.  The process of re-gilding has to be repeated every few years. 

 

The gates at Versailles

Versailles

Perhaps it cannot be seen in this photo but even the clock has the sun in the center for Louis XIV the Sun King. 

 

The Hall of Mirrors.

One wall is windowed the opposite wall is mirrored.  There are 56,000 candles to light the hall in the evening.  The average person of that time period would have had four or five candles.  There is gold leaf along the ceiling and between the paintings.  Almost all the rooms had ceilings with magnificent paintings on them. 

 

The Queen’s bedroom

 

 This room or hallway was perhaps the least ornate and most restful for me.  The portraits of leaders and generals decorated the walls. 

The Gardens at Versailles

 

Oh so French--do you see the couple kissing by the fountain?  The gardens are immense stretching for what seems like miles as far as the eye can see with ponds, statuary, trees and flowers.  Once again everything is orderly and symmetrical.  Angelique said that the king would often have parties here with 20,000 or more guests.  The day we were there music was softly playing through speakers but in the days of Louis XIV and his successors there would have been live orchestras.  

 

Looking back up toward the castle from partway down the garden path.

Mrs. Gimlet has been posting pictures and accounts of our travels too on her blog.  Check it out here:  http://www.gimletblog.com

Paris -- Musée de Cluny

Musée de Cluny, the entrance is the first small brown door at the bottom right

We did get to the Musée de Cluny while in Paris (see Postcard Thursday, #34).  It was one of several places on our to do list.  We knew we wouldn’t get to see everything but this was definitely one museum we hoped we could fit in.  Musée de Cluny is amazing.  Parts of the building are extremely old, dating from Roman times.  Some of the items on display in the museum dated from 935 AD most were from the 1100s and 1200s. 

The Cluny was a good choice for us because it is a smaller museum and meant we wouldn’t get quite as overwhelmed with all the artifacts.  It is also perhaps not as well known or as popular as some of the other larger museums hence fewer people, better views of the things we wanted to see and a more relaxed visit. 

Our main objective in visiting this small museum was to see the Lady and the Unicorn tapestries but we found many other interesting things there as well including Roman baths, the heads of the Old Testament kings that had been removed from Notre Dame cathedral during the French Revolution, examples of medieval armor, religious icons, leaded glass window panels and statuary as well as other tapestries.  The Unicorn tapestry is huge.  There are five panels that cover one entire wall and an additional section on a second wall. 

Most of the display areas in the museum were dimly lit, presumably to help protect and preserve the items, making picture taking almost impossible with my small point and shoot camera because no flash pictures were allowed.  Mrs. Gimlet could do much better with her bigger camera and changeable settings and lenses.  I did not realize that even my pre-flash red-eye reduction light would prove to be a bit more than the museum wanted but I did get a couple of photos before I was told to stop.  They were very nice about it and I apologized.

Four of the five panels of the Lady & the Unicorn tapestry

The five panels represent the five senses, smell, hearing, touch, taste and sight.  The sixth panel depicts the sixth sense or the moral and spiritual heart.  

Sixth panel of the Lady & the Unicorn tapestry

The tapestries are made of wool and silk and were woven about 1500 AD.  

The heads of the kings were another attraction.  Up high all along the front of the Notre Dame Cathedral are statues of kings from the Old Testament.  

Row of Old Testament kings across the front approximately halfway up the building

During the French Revolution the cathedral of Notre Dame was stormed, most of the leaded glass windows were smashed, the heads were removed from the kings and the bodies were also vandalized.  This happened because the people saw any figure that had a crown or looked religious as representation of the oppressors and thus became targets to be taken down or destroyed.  The replacement set of leaded glass windows wasn’t completed until about 1938 just before World War II.  At the beginning of the war to protect the windows from bombing damage they were dismantled, each piece of glass numbered, and then sunk in the Seine River until after the end of the war when they were taken out of the river and reassembled like a giant jigsaw puzzle. 

One of the Rose windows, Notre Dame Cathedral

During the Revolution someone collected the heads of the kings but it wasn’t until the 1970s that all but a couple of the heads of the kings were rediscovered.  By that time the heads and bodies had been replaced years earlier so the original pieces were sent to the Cluny museum where we saw them.  

Some of the original carved heads of the Old Testament kings taken from Notre Dame

The heads are made of Lutetian limestone and were carved between 1210 and 1258 AD.  The heads and the bodies suffered significant damage as is shown in these photos.  

The bodies of the kings and Mrs. Gimlet

Also at the Cluny was this magnificent icon done in layered gold a process called Limoges.

Figidarium

The Roman baths were on three different levels, one outside, this one (the frigidarium—cold bath) above, and one more.  This was built in 200 AD the ceiling and floor have been left to age.

When I got home I really wished I had worn a pedometer for the trip.  To give an idea of how far we walked when in Paris the first day we walked past the Cluny this day we took the Metro.  It was five stops from our hotel, not an insignificant distance!  By this point, however, we were used to walking all over Paris and from the Cluny we strolled the rest of the way to Notre Dame stopping at a little stand to get an ice cream cone. 

If this is Thursday it must be postcards, 37

Le Palais du Luxembourg, ca 1900

I thought it might be interesting to compare these two pictures, one taken around 1900 and the other in April 2012. 

Le Palais du Luxembourg, 2012

Completed in 1631 this building was once the royal palace until the Revolution.  At various times it has been used as a prison, headquarters for the Luftwaffe during World War II, bomb shelters were under the gardens and it is now used by the French Senate.  It is located inside a large lovely park on the Left Bank called the Jardin due Luxembourg.  The park was not too far from our hotel and we walked through it on our first day in Paris.  There are two other parks to the south that are only separated by the streets so it is an immense green area altogether.   The gardens are all symmetrical with the trees cut in precise lines—rectangles, circles, and triangles and several statues and fountains.  Every shape is symbolic, the triangle points to heaven, the circles represent the eternal nature, and the rectangles order in the world.  One of the parks was a “nature or natural park” but it was as planned and orderly as the others.  Pleasing to look at, restful even, but to me they all show that man made them and seem like gardens more than parks.  It was interesting and quite different from the nature parks and wildlife preserves we have here in the US.  

 

Looking toward the Jardin du Luxembourg

Pond in the Jardin du Luxembourg.

 

Children often sail small toy boats in the pond although the day were there we did not see any doing so.  As in most of the parks we visited there are statues along the walkway.  Part of the Eiffel Tower can be seen in the background.

Looking from the Jardin du Luxembourg toward the Jardin des Grands Exploratuers

Fountain in the Jardin des Grands Explorateurs

Paris, France snippets . . . Eiffel Tower

 

Eiffel Tower

No trip to Paris would be complete without a visit to the Eiffel Tower.  My camera battery gave out the evening we were atop the Arc de Triomphe so unfortunately I didn’t get any good shots of the Eiffel Tower in her evening gown (with lights).  However I did get two daytime photos that I liked.  This one in soft color that shows the whole tower and the one below that shows some of the ironwork closer up.  Our guide explained that the people hated the tower when it was first built.  A group of artists even petitioned the city to have it removed describing the Tower as looking like an “ugly iron smoke stack” complaining that it was so tall it took away from the beauty of the other attractions in the city.  The writer Guy du Maupassant would dine in the first level restaurant in order to avoid having to look at the tower. 

The public worried the tower would rust but mostly it was thought to be ugly and possibly dangerous since it was so tall.  The Eiffel Tower was the tallest building in the world until 1931 when the Empire State Building was completed in New York City.  It was supposed to be torn down after the Universal Exhibition (World’s Fair) of 1889 of but by the end of the allotted time the people had changed their minds and the tower remains as one of the iconic symbols of Paris.  Mrs. Gimlet got a stunning night picture (see http://gimletblog.com/2012/04/25/france-2012-amuse-bouche-seven-super-shots?owa_medium=feed&owa_sid= ).

When we were there the elevator up to the first landing was being serviced and not in use.  There are 360 steps to get to the second elevator and over 1,600 steps if one were to climb all the way to the top and not use an elevator.  We did not have any takers for making the climb that day but I think some of the students may have gone back later on their free time. 

Eiffel Tower, close up  

The complex pattern of girders was necessary to stabilize the tower in high winds. There are two restaurants, one on the first level and the other on the second level.  Over 200 million people have visited the tower since it was built.  From “Eyewitness Travel, Paris” p. 195 some trivia facts:  “the tower is 1,065 feet tall including the antennae; the top can move in a curve of 7 inches under the effect of heat; there are 1,665 steps to the third level; 2.5 million rivets hold the tower together; the tower never sways more than 2.5 inches; the third or top level of the tower can hold 800 people at one time, the tower weighs 10,100 tons; and 60 tons of paint are used every seven years” to beautify and protect the structure from rust.  The Eiffel Tower was last painted in 2009-2010.  Our guide said it takes about 18 months to paint the tower.  The tower is lit at night plus there is a show of spectacular twinkling lights that lasts for 5 minutes and is repeated on the hour from dusk to midnight.  We saw it.  Like 4th of July fireworks here in the US, it perhaps has to be seen in person to get the full effect.  Thing One did take a short video of the sparking lights and there are several clips on YouTube such as this one: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nTaq_MI6ey8.  Enjoy. 

If this is Thursday it must be postcards, 36

Avenue l’Opera in central Paris, ca 1900

Unlike many of the avenues in Paris the Avenue de l’Opera has few trees aside from those pictured here and is not what could be termed tree lined.  This was the result of a compromise between the designer of the avenue (Haussman) and the architect of the Opera House (Garnier) so that an unobstructed view from the Louvre would be possible.  Today the avenue is filled with shops and cafés.  Before the Opera House was built, however, the area was made up of narrow streets that were considered unhealthy and dangerous.  Those streets were replaced beginning in 1854 but the avenue was not completed until 1873.  During part of that construction phase it was called “avenue Napoleon” for a few years but renamed Avenue of the Opera in 1873.  The last of the buildings along the avenue were built in 1879.  There is a lovely painting by Camille Pissarro, one of the famous French Impressionists, titled "Avenue de l'Opera" that was done in 1898.  For more information see:  http://en.wikipedia.org/Avenue_de_l’Opera

This is where Mrs. Gimlet and I got lost despite clear instructions from our guide, Angelique.  We exited from the Louvre looking for the avenue that should have been directly to our left.  We are still not sure what happened but we went too far, then returned and went too far a second time in the opposite direction.  There were what seemed like hundreds of small stalls camped out on the sidewalk hawking all sorts of wares for tourists.  It was crowded.  After going back and forth a couple of times we crossed to the other side and stopped to sit on a convenient ledge, pulled out the meager city map, and tried to get our bearings.  Mrs. Gimlet walked down to the end of the current block to see the name of that street and we trudged back the other direction once again only this time on the less crowded side of the street.  Since we had been warned repeatedly about pickpockets we were glad to be away from the crush of people, the small stalls and also where we could see where we were heading. 

Finally we found the avenue and all the stores.  This was supposed to be our Paris shopping afternoon but by now we were tiring, had used up a good portion of our free time and still had several stores we wanted to visit.  We did get into one boutique and successfully made a purchase hopped outside and found the shoe store but there was a doorman limiting access to the store because it was pretty crowded inside.  We were supposed to meet the rest of the group for dinner, had yet to find the Metro station, would need to change trains, and meet up with everybody in the square by the Moulin Rouge in a short while.  We couldn’t take the time to stand in line waiting to get into a store so we left.  Sadly we were unable to get to the needlework shop Mrs. Gimlet wanted to visit or to the Ladurée store to get macaroons.  But we knew there was another chance for Ladurée at Versailles the next day.  We were still a bit fearful of getting lost once again so we hurried on to find the Metro.  Apart from being packed in an extremely crowded train car with a group of British girls dressed like cows* the Metro ride was uneventful, transfers successful and arrival at Moulin Rouge well ahead of schedule.  We sat and people watched feeling like Parisians while waiting for everyone else to arrive.

Moulin Rouge, Paris

...................................................................................

Note:

*  It took a small child on the train to ask the girls why they were dressed like cows.  The girls said that one of them was getting married and this was the equivalent of a stag party, a sort of scavenger hunt, they were laughing and smiling while their cow bells tinkled cheerfully.