La Brocante

One of the highlights of my recent trip to Paris was stumbling into the brocante de printemps 2013 de la rue de Bretagne in the Marais. It happens the first weekend of June and last weekend of November each year and has over 500 sellers.  Brocantes are best described as movable flea markets while the real flea markets or puces have a set location.  The best things to look for are table linens, flatware, and decorative objects. I bought a lot of great items but regret passing up some others. There are a few sites that list the weekend brocante locations (here and here) but if anyone has a better one, please let me know. 

Happy hunting!

I bought one of chickens for my mom for 5 €.

I bought this book of fold out maps of Paris from 1889 for only 15 €.

My friend Carlos almost bought this set of glassware at the same table.

The Europeans know how to best clean and display linens.

This flush mount fixture had a tag for 80 €, the seller asked for 60 € and I paid 50  €. Glad I packed a Longchap bag in my suitcase to carry all my treasures home. 

The brocante in the Marais was lined with cafes of cute Parisian hipster boys. An added bonus!

All photos by moi taken with my iPhone 5.

Fashion Power Couple Apartment

When it comes to fashion power couples, it doesn't get more powerful than Ed Filipowski and Mark Lee.  Ed is the co-president of KCD, the special events firm that puts on many of the chicest shows at fashion week like Marc Jacobs, Tory Burch, and Derek Lam.  Mark is the CEO of Barneys, the retail store where I spend way too much money.  I can only imagine the fashion fueled conversations that take place at their prewar penthouse on the west side. While they had help from architect Mark Janson of Janson Goldstein, they chose to decorate it themselves.  Some pieces came from the Paris flea markets which may explain why Barneys now has pieces from the Marche aux Puces for sale on the Chelsea Passage floor.  Once fashion week is over and my feet have recovered, I plan to walk over there and check it out. Until then, you can see out some pics online here and read the whole apartment story here. 

Photos by Ngoc Minh Ngo for Architectural Digest