Feel free to feel yourselves like at home

Imagine this: you're in the heart of Paris, looking for a cozy place where to treat your senses with some delicious gourmet plates and warm drinks.. Your walking around the 3rd district, the area full of crowdy bars and chic restaurants but none of them really seems to invite you in. You're passing them all... Until.. Right there, right at the back of the 404 restaurant and Andy Wahloo cocktail bar you see it.. The Place To Go. This venue, called Derrière (= back, in french) presents itself as a typical Parisian family apartment, literally, and has that special atmosphere which is hard to resist. Decoration of a French baroque house, Derriere is equipped with numerous "little touches" which makes the guests feel as if they're hanging out at a friend's place or just enjoying themselves on a small house-party.

Little wooden chairs, messy bookshelves loaded with huge piles of books, an old ‘baignoire’, a bed placed in the middle of the room space and lots of other objects do guarantee the place a unique coolness and an atmosphere you hardly could get from other places. Upon arrival you are welcomed by the staff and get to choose your sitting according to your mood: a settling in the traditional dining room, playing ping-pong in the salon, watching a film in the ‘movies’ designated area or having a cocktail in the boudoir. The venue also offers a more quiet area on the upstairs, which functions as a bedroom, and guests can go to relax.

Well, You think this is it? A place like this coulnd't exist without a secret room, a delicately discrete fumoir where smoking is "off the record", the entrance is from an old baroque wardrobe door covered with mirror (the one you see on the picture above). Huh, pretty exiting, imagine to meet someone you like at this restaurant and by the end of the evening, after many tickeling looks, you suddenly find yourself with that person in the secret room.. Enough of my imagination, my point is, this place is fantastic for all kinds of dates, birthdays, weddings, themed parties.. what ever you imagine to celebrate.

I personally like this idea of a venue a lot. Spending your evening in a place like this is a perfect way to enjoy a good company and just to relax in a friendly-homie ambient. No stress of have to be extra polite or extra-chic. It surely is on top of my list of places where to go in Paris.

What do you think of the place?
Would you eat there or you'd rather prefer just a cocktail or two?

INFORMATION:

69, rue des Gravilliers 75003 Paris
info@derriere-resto.com
+ 33 1 44 61 91 95
(a reservation is required at least 5 days before the date)
* the prices are circa from 45euros, a normal menu, up to 70euros for à la carte

PS! My dear french readers and especially those from Paris, have you ever been there? If so tell us about your experience:)

Hôtel Costes

Ranked as the coolest hotel in the world by TripAdvisor, it's time to make a post about the Hôtel Costes itself. I already wrote about the music- in the collaboration between this famous DJ Stéphane Pompougnac and the hotel have seen light a collection of the best chill-out lounge music in the world.(click for more!). But what about the hotel? Although it's more famous because of the music and the café in the courtyard (really lovely!) also the interiors are worth talking about.



Located in 239 rue St-Honore, in the first arrondissement in Paris and only few steps from the Ritz. Commissioned by the Costes brothers (limonadiers, French slang for café owners, the Costes family owns the best ones in town) to the designer and architect Jacques Garcìa in 1991. The hotel is now renowned as a den of opulence, the design maxim was "all things in excess".



"Napoleon III style revitalised in the purple and gold rooms. Splendid Italian style courtyard and lovely fitness centre. An extravagant luxury hotel, popular with the jet-set. The restaurant of the Hôtel Costes is a shrine to the latest lounge trend." - Michelin.



"This is the one place where the fashion crowd is sure to be, whether it be staying in the rooms, dining in the restaurant, or tersely sipping champagne or cocktails while people-watching in the Stygian darkness of the back bar."- New York Times.





".. a seductive haunt of mysterious corners and important rendezvous, a meeting place that has established itself as the center of the fashion world in Paris since it opened.."- TIME, CNN.





*In the Costes bar you can taste one of the ten best mojitos served in Paris (16.5 points out of a possible 20). It's 19€/per drink.
*To get a hint of the 12th album of HC go on their site. (click)

CHANEL S/S 2010 SHOW

"Spectacular, Spectacular
No words in the vernacular
Can describe this great event
You'll be dumb with wonderment"- Moulin Rouge.

.

Show. Show? SHOW! Chanel's show is not just a show. It's THE SHOW.

The Grand Palais was transformed into a barn, check it out yourself. PLUS at one point, Lily Allen came out of the floor and performed her latest hit "It's not Fair", which I, by the way, totally adore.

"Freja, Baptiste and Lara decided to have a ménage à trois.."

These pictures were taken from Garance Dorè blog

Watch the clip, Lily SINGS!

Some of my favourite looks:






















FONT: style.com

Carefree life, Flickleness and Joie de Vivre..

"Sometimes I would venture from my sepulchre to the jazz of night Paris, where having gathered the colours, I would think them over in front of the fire. I could be seen walking through a funeral corridor of my house and descending down a black spiral of steep stairs; rushing underground to Montmartre, all impatience to see the fiery rubies of the Moulin Rouge cross. I wandered thereabouts, then bought a ticket to watch frenzied delirium of feathers, vulgar painted lips, and eyelashes of black and blue.

Naked feet, and thighs, and arms, and breasts were being flung on me from bloody-red foam of translucent clothes. The tuxedoed goatees and crooked noses in white vests and toppers would line the hall, with their hands posed on canes. Then I found myself in a pub, where the liqueurs were served on a coffin (not a table) by the nickering devil: "Drink it, you wretched!" Having drunk, I returned under the black sky split by the flaming vanes, which the radiant needles of my eyelashes cross-hatched. In front of my nose a stream of bowler hats and black veils was still pulsing, foamy with bluish green and warm orange of feathers worn by the night beauties: to me they were all one, as I had to narrow my eyes for insupportable radiance of electric lamps, whose hectic fires would be dancing beneath my nervous eyelids for many a night to come."

- a letter written in 1906 about the Tavern of Hell by Andrei Bely, a russian novelist.

Today it's the 120th birthday of Moulin Rouge. The cabaret was first founded in the occasion Exposition Universelle, in 1889, the same year when the Tower of Eiffel was completed. Since then, the venue hasn't felt or seen crisis at all and continues selling 240.000 bottles of Champagne per year.
So cin cin! and let you champagne pop because the eternal magic of Moulin Rouge shall never fade..

4 Places to go/see

1.MILAN

Why: Frank O. Gehry since 1997

Where: Triennale di Milano

When: September 09 – January 10

I'm sure almost everyone is familiar with that strange deformed building in Prague they call Dancing House. (above) If not then maybe by mentioning Guggenheim Museum Bilbao, something will shine out from the fog? Ok. If these two buildings do not say anything to you then you really URGE to see this exhibition! We are talking about one of the most significant architects of the 20^th century- Frank O. Gehry, the first one to introduce digital projecting and an artist who totally changed the way we look on contemporary architecture now. He's everything else than traditional and to describe his style as “modern” is a really modest way to talk about his work.

Pritzker Prize and Golden Lion (for his career). Not bad.

2. NEW YORK

Why: Tim Burton's retrospective

Where: MoMA

When: November 09 – April 10

Beetlejuice, Batman, Edward Scissorhands, Batman Returns, The Nightmare Before Christmas , Ed Wood , Mars Attacks!, Sleepy Hollow, Big Fish, Corpse Bride, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, and Sweeney Todd..

Oh, just some works you may find in his curriculum... + Oscar and Golden Lion winner. Don't you just die to know more and more about this genius- said very modestly- and his work, his evolution and his world?!?! (wow that even rimes..) No need to add anything else.

3.AMSTERDAM

Why: "At the Russian Court"

Where: Hermitage Amsterdam and Amstelhof

When: June 09 – January 10

A recreation of life at the Russian court during the nineteenth century: luxurious dinners, mask balls and banquettes, the marvellous gowns and other costumes, the art of dressing and make-up by the russian courtesans, precious jewelery worn by tsars and tsarinnas themselves and antique furniture which used to decorate their private rooms. This and more (1800 objects in total) loaned from the State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, and organized by Merkx+Girod Architecten with photographs, projections and music.

4. PARIS

Why: "Tyen: 30 Years of Creation"

Where: Palais de Tokyo, 16 Avenue du Président Wilson, Parigi 16e.

When: 29-30 Settembre

Last but not least... Tyen's photographs. Okay, said like this... Who the h*ll's Tyen? Well... he's that creative guy who has been designing and deciding which colours are in and which out on your face for the next season for the last thirty-freaking-years! At DIOR's make-up house. Design director, photographer, master of colour.

His key to success:“I don’t think about trends. Just about how women can be beautiful — and comfortable.” His moto: “Make-up is a final touch; a bit of camouflage to say, ‘I’m healthy, I’m happy and I love you.”