La Dolce (and Gabbana) Vita

Autumn in Italy!  No place I would rather be...but I'm not, at least not this year.   Despite all my plotting and planning instead of the hills of Tuscany or the lakes of Bellagio or port of Portofino I am at my desk.  So when Dolce and Gabbana launched their Spring 2016 Ready-to -Wear Collection I couldn't get enough.

Each of the 90 so pieces on the runway took me to a different and beloved corner of Italy...Amalfi, Capri, Lake Como, Rome, Venice, Sicily, Portofino...

The Collection, Italia is Love, was filled with Italian sunshine and color- lemons, oranges, flowers, Venetian stripes, Italian film sirens...

Sunglasses, Sundresses and Sophia

The show was all about seeing Italy from the Tourist side-perhaps in post-war Italy.  Inspiration from vintage postcards and movie and travel posters.  Accessories and details reflected the handmade souvenirs-embroidery,ceramics,fabrics-that you can find to this day in street shops and stalls in every tourist area of Italy...  bursting with color, straw bags, embroidered fabrics, embellished circle skirts , printed scarves...

At every turn this runway was a celebration and each piece a love letter to Italian joy.

  “You see?” exclaimed Gabbana. “We don’t believe in fashion for trends any more. We want to show emotion. Just enjoy!”

Grazie Dolce and Gabbana for my trip to La Dolce Vita---complete with a few selfies--Perfetto!

Images VIA

Today and Always... Paris!

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 2014 was a year filled with such pain, and the hope for the New Year was that the world would know peace... but within just the first week of 2015 we know that is not to be.  May we never get used to the images we watched unfold this week. Throughout the world terrorism has become a "reality"  but a reality that we must never accept as the "norm".  We must be horrified,  we must be outraged, and we must grieve and mourn for all who have such horror brought to their lives. As the streets of one of the most iconic and magnificent cities in the world became still with horror and fear it brought those of us in Boston back to our week of  terror after the Marathon bombings.  My heart was in Paris as it is in Nigeria and with the world as we struggle to understand.

I choose to focus on the good, the beauty, the strength, the courage and the grace of a world I still believe in.  I choose to go... to experience...to travel...to live... and for this day to celebrate another city I love--J'Adore Paris. 

 This from the members of the Paris Opera Ballet via Elle

...and There's a Moat!

via Veranda

Every designer muscle in me is itching of late.  I think everyone should redesign their life on a regular basis-even if it is just flipping pillows, moving furniture about or buying yourself a new set of sheets.  You need that infusion of something new-it helps clear the cobwebs literally and figuratively.   As much as I love my 19thc little stone caretaker's cottage of a Moneypit I thrive on a challenge and am always on the hunt for my next project...think I may have found it!

via Veranda

It seems that famed French actress, and timeless beauty, Catherine Deneuve has put her 18thc Normandy Chateau on the market. Of course it is sublime, a reflection of its owner indeed.  

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Ms. Deneuve's elegance, grace and enduring style are the stuff of legends ...and a legend should live like one! 

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 With a truly cinematic facade, and its movie-set perfect gardens, Catherine Deneuve's home outside Paris, along the banks of the Eure River, has four master suites, a sauna, naturally many guest rooms and of course a cinema.  One can only assume that there are closets galore filled with Hermes bags, Chanel Jackets and decades of Dior, Yves Saint Laurent...

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When you close your eyes and imagine yourself living in France...well, this just might be what you envision- everything one could dream of for a French Country Chateau. 

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 It certainly would be for me...did I mention there's a moat?!!  I'm in love.  Call Air France!

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Paris- "Always a Good Idea!"

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“A walk about Paris will provide lessons in history, beauty, and in the point of Life.”

-Thomas Jefferson

One of my favorite daydreaming past times is prepping travel plans.  I spend countless hours researching the perfect locales, hotel hunting is a passion and creating "must visit" itineraries never gets old.

The Hotel Plaza Athenee Paris via

 Of course most of these carefully and lovingly prepared personal travel guides lie waiting  for the bags to be packed... but there they are in neat happy colored file folders for when "whenever" comes...

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Even without airline tickets booked or days circled on the calendar, whenever my day gets away from me and I need to be elsewhere I can always pick up my voluminous travel notebooks and float off  into "where to go land".

 Carnavelet Museum via

I can plot my travels anytime, anywhere, whenever the mood hits and the inspiration can be anything. Usually my travel fantasies fly to Tuscany or the Italian coast but this week wherever I turn ,just in time for Bastille Day, I see Paris!

Striped Ts are stacked on my closet shelves and images of Parisian style, gardens and architecture fill my Tumblr queue.

 Paris Themed Toms via

My movie lists are also feeling the joie with classics that celebrate  Paris and the  Romance of the quintessential European city:

An American in Paris

Midnight in Paris
An American in Paris
A Little Romance
Funny Face
Charade
Sabrina
How to Steal a Million
Forget Paris
Paris When it Sizzles
French Kiss
Julie and Julia

Before Sunset
Mrs. Arris Goes to Paris
The Red Balloon

Funny Face

This probably all started with Eloisa James' wonderful memoir of her family's year in Paris-Paris in Love.

If you can't hop a plane curl up with a joy of a read! Here are some of my favorite Go To spots for tout Francais et Paris-So don your Dior, go hop Les Bateaux Mouche,  indulge in a taste of Laduree , wrap yourself in Hermes, get lost at the Louvre, walk in Coco's, dance along the Seine and fall in love because as Audrey said..."Paris is always a good idea!"

Vicki Archer's French Essence Blog
Vicki Archer, French Essence
Ina Garten,  Barefoot in Paris
Julia Child,  My Life in France
Ines de la Fressange,  Parisian Chic
Jennifer Scott, Lessons from Madame Chic
Dorie Greenspan, Around My French Table
Charles Faudreee, Home 
Peter Mayle, A Year in Provence 
Pierre Deux's French Country 
Vicki Archer, My French Life

Via Janelle Burger

All Aboard! Marc Jacobs for LV Takes the Paris Runway on a Romantic Ride

I have one  big wish-to sit front row at Paris Fashion week.  This year I watched, with my bunny slippers on, all the shows from NYFW through to Paris.

Oscar de la Renta

I loved Valentino, Chanel, Balmain, Dior, McQueen, Oscar de la Renta, Nina Ricci, Burberry, Marchesa...luxurious fabrics,bejeweled pattens and elegant drama at every turn... but stop the train---Marc Jacobs brought the Grand Finale to the Autumn/Winter 2012-13 Fashion Weeks.

 I adore Runway-maybe because I adore fashion and theatre and nowhere do the two meet as on the runway.  Most shows are often a parade of new looks but this week Marc Jacobs pulled into the station and left the others in a cloud of locomotive steam.

The train arrived onto the temporary LV station at Cour Carrée du Louvre which was edged in iron and adorned with a massive train clock, a-la Hugo, that glowed throughout the show as the locomotive blasted steam to set the mood.

As the train made its stop on the runway the models one by one descended the carriage. Each was  greeted by a white gloved porter who carried their LV luggage and bags. As they circled the tracks  music evocative of the pace of a train taking you along on a magical journey set the pace- enchanting, romantic and memorable--all that a runway should be.

“I thought, ‘No girl will carry a bag this season,’” said Jacobs. “It will be carried for her.” -Marc Jacobs

This week's amazing RTW Fall 2012 runway/station show at Paris Fashion Week by Marc Jacobs for Louis Vuitton was elegant theatre- romantic, dramatic and unforgettable! Through a cloud of steam emerged exquisitely dressed first class passengers/models wearing towering hats with feathers, three quarter coats with ankle length skirts and pants, Mary Jane- esque pumps, luxe fabrics and patterns reflecting the classic LV checks embellished and bejeweled with crystals and oversized ornate buttons. The clothes were nostalgic - Mary Poppins meets Downton Abbey and even The Mad Hatter all aboard The Venice Simplon Orient Express. Reminiscent of an era when traveling clothes were essential to any well dressed woman's wardrobe, a time when train travel was elegant and all about luxury...Come Visit The Shopping Bag Chronicles

...and how do you travel without bags??-the show was as much about the bags as the clothes...

For me this show from start to finish was simply about the romance of travel, a bygone age- luxurious,sometimes mysterious,elegant,dramatic and alluring. An era often captured on film and in literature and now by Mr, Jacobs on the runway. Come Visit The Shopping Bag Chronicles and Applause!

Watch the Show-a Great Ride!



The show made me think of some of my favorite romantic, fun and fashionable train images and posters-Come  Visit Applause!  Enjoy!!

Audrey Hepburn, Funny Face

The Art of the Stroll--Pausing in St Paul de Vence

Enter by the walls

 Follow the walkways

 Take the stairs

Peek through doors, windows and around each corner...

Have an Artful day and leave your heart in St Paul de Vence!