Random Parisian oddities

I wrote a post recently on beautiful strangeness, odd yet beautiful things I had seen in my travels round Paris.

Here, I've gathered together a plain ol' oddities collection.

Here's a scenario that is not at all odd if you happen to be a Parisian. But if you're not, then you maybe a little taken aback. The spaces at the other ends of both these cars were not big. I wonder how they managed when it was time to move.

I'm rather partial to these urban hay bails.

Here is a FANTASTIC shoe shop, KATA, on boulevard Barbès. There are quite a few of these KATA shops but this one is the biggest and the best. It is located in an old theatre. I don't know how long this shop has been here, but they haven't even taken down the velvet curtains since it was a theatre. There are white tiles on the floors and wire basket crates of shoes piled high with anything from filthy broken ancient shoes you wouldn't touch with a barge pole, to designer 'chaussures de marques' that you can pick up for a song. This is one of those places you have to go to regularly. Sometimes they have amazing bargains, and sometimes they have nothing. They may have something you adore, but will only have it in one size. I mostly get the kids shoes here, why pay 80euros for a pair of kids shoes when you can pay 10? I only managed to take this one photo because I was quickly asked to stop, but you get the gist. Unfortunately I didn't get all the elaborate gold mouldings on the ceiling.

On the subject of footwear, there seems to be a few street artists in the Montmartre neighbourhood who like shoes. I have now seen about 4 pairs of trainers strung up on a wire, round and about the 18th.

Some people prefer slippers.

Which brings me to the slipper factory, 'fabrique de pantoufles', out by Porte de Montmartre, which always makes me smile when I walk past.

As do these chairs. You can't fault their logic.

This shop also made me chuckle (it is now a hairdressers). It reminded me of my brain. Cluttered.

These doors to an 'école maternelle' (kindergarten) left me confused. How on earth can you justify putting rifles on the front door of a school for 3-6 year olds? A school that was designed to be a school?

In contrast, I LOVED this bath we spotted at the Marchés aux puces at St Ouen. It's not even one of the 'sabot' baths that have a step/seat in them. We have a pretty small bath, but not this small.

I was a little perplexed by this sign.

This shop confused me as well. What is it you people are selling?

I found this chair in a entrance way to an appartment block on rue Durantin. 

'If you're tired before going up the stairs. SIT DOWN. But don't take the chair'. NB-enormous red chain to prevent such a thing happening.

Glass

Shiny, transparent, translucide, sparkly, etched, coloured, bubbled, blown, crackled, cracked, frosted...

Here is some different kinds of glass I have found around Paris, quite of few of them found in the gutters no less. 

Here's a broken window pane.

Glass insulators, these are just so attractive, especially if you're lucky enough to find one that's clean.

Here's a stain glass window in the Cimetière de Montmartre.

Here are some dinosaurs having a  blood tea party.

More Cimetière de Montmartre stain glass windows. 

Stained glass on the Sacré Cœur, at the rear of the church. 

A beer bottle chases its' shadow in the fountain below the Sacré Cœur.

I always wonder what the light must be like sitting up in this glass veranda on rue Lepic.

I'm not sure what goes on in this building just south of Pigale on rue Frochot, apparently it is a billiards club, the 'Association du Cercle Central Académie de Billard des Boulevards'. Some billiards club! The curved stain glass window is just amazing.

Reinforced, yet broken, glazing can look ok too, as long as it's not part of your home.

Here is some broken glass reflecting the surrounding buildings.

And these glass rushes on the Pont Alexandre III are amazing, especially when they catch the light.

The lampposts are quite extravangant as well, they look like glass whipped chantilly.

Glasses at the Marchés aux puces de St Ouen. Spoilt for choice.

A light bulb on the  manège just below the Sacré Cœur.

And last but not least a lovely stain glass window in  L'église Saint-Pierre de Montmartre.

Circles are divine

“The horizon of many people is a circle with zero radius which they call their point of view.” Albert Einstein

I suspect most people love a circle. Somehow we can't resist them. In the past medieval scholars, and many others believed that there was something intrinsically "divine" or "perfect" that could be found in circles. 

Needless to say I have a collection of circles. 

Here are a few.

Pink flower.

Glass detail on a tombstone in the Cimetière de Montmartre.

Plum cake.

Glass candle holder.

Christmas lights.

Metro chair, Villier Station, Paris.

Blue moon, garden of  Le musée du quai Branly.

Leaves through a bubble.

Café table.

Thistle in Donegal, Ireland.

Thistle in Le square Léon Serpolet, Paris 18th.

White flowers through a bubble.

Dandelion clock.

Kugelhopf mould, marché aux puces de St Ouen.

Parisian cats eye.

And last but not least, the Tadao Ando Meditation Space, UNESCO Paris.

More bbonthebrink circles can be found here

Happy New Year - Bonne Année

I never thought a pigeon could come in use, but there you go, it did.